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THE 
GOLDEN TREASURY 

SELECTED FROM THE BEST SONGS AND LYRICAL 

POEMS IN THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND 

ARRANGED WITH NOTES 

BY 

FRANCIS T. PALGRAVE 

>F POETRi II 
OF OXFORD 



EDITED WITH AN INTRODUCTION AND FURTHER 
NOTES BY ALLAN ABBOTT. A.M., HEAD 
OF THE ENGLISH DEPARTMENT IN THE 
HORACE MANN HIGH SCHOOL, TEACHERS 
COLLEGE, COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY 




NEW YORK 
CHARLES E. MERRILL COMPANY 



This series of books includes in complete editions those master- 
pieces of English Literature that are best adapted for the use of 
schools and colleges. The editors of the several volumes are 
chosen for their special qualifications in connection with the texts 
issued under their individual supervision, but familiarity with 
the practical needs of the classroom, no less than sound scholar- 
ship, characterizes the editing of every book in the series. 

In connection with each text, a critical and historical introduc- 
tion, including a sketch of the life of the author and his relation 
to the thought of his time, critical opinions of the work in ques- 
tion chosen from the great body of English criticism, and, where 
possible, a portrait of the author, are given. Ample explanatory 
notes of such passages in the text as call for special attention are 
supplied, but irrelevant annotation and explanations of the ob- 
vious are rigidly excluded. 

CHARLES E. MERRILL COMPANY. 



Copyright, 1911 

BY 

CHARLES E. MERRILL CO. 



4^ o^co 

©CI.A3()5:^48 



CONTENTS 



Introduction page 

Lyric Poetry 5 

Francis Turner Palgrave 19 

Critical Opinions of the Golden Treasury . . 21 

How to Teach the Golden Treasury .... 23 

Books for Further Study 25 

Dedication to Alfred Tennyson 27 

Preface by Francis Turner Palgrave ..... 29 

Book First 33 

Book Second 103 

Book Third 205 

Book Fourth 291 

Notes 493 

Topics for Study 525 

Index of Writers 527 

Index op First Lines 537 



INTRODUCTION 



LYRIC POETRY 

The Golden Treasury has for half a century been the accepted 
collection of the best English verse, for the period it covers, 
from the age of Ehzabeth to about 1830, The selections were 
made by a poet, Francis Turner Palgrave, with the advice of 
one of the greatest modern poets, Alfred Tennyson.^ 

What lyric poetry is, and what it means to a man of poetic 
appreciation, can best be seen by reading Palgrave's own 
Preface (p. 29). As we turn over the leaves of the book, we 
see that the subjects of poetry are as varied as life itself; we 
find poems on war and patriotism, on birth and death, on flowers, 
trees, and streams, on the sea and the sky; poems on friendship 
and on love in all degrees, — youthful romance, lovers parted 
or forsaken, love in marriage and in old age; poems of compli- 
ment, of humor, of regret, of aspiration. It is not the subject 
that makes the poem, but what the poet sees in it, beyond the 
vision of the rest of us. Shakespeare's banished duke found 

"Tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, 
Sermons in stones, and good in everything;" 

and Wordsworth said 

"To me the meanest flower that blows can give 
Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears." 

This power of seeing beyond the superficial fact to some more 
important and significant truth is what we mean by the poetic 
imagination. By this power of imagination the poet summons 
up whatever comparisons will throw the essential quality of 

1 See introduction by Edward Hutton to the Booklovers' Library 
edition of The Golden Treasury. 

5 



6 INTRODUCTION 

the fact out into the Hght. The song of an unseen skylark, 
for instance, reminds Shelley (p. 393) of all manner of pure and 
bright loveliness from a hidden source, — moonlight from behind 
a cloud, hymns of an unknown poet, love songs of a maiden in a 
palace tower, a glow-worm hidden in the grass, or a rose bud in 
its own leaves, — 

"all that ever was 
Joyous and clear and fresh," — 

and those of us who have never even heard a skylark, gain an 
appreciation of the beauty of its song far above any matter-of- 
fact description. Still greater is the poet's power of seeing, 
imaginatively, into the hearts of commonplace people, and find- 
ing their hidden motives and ideals. We may think of sailors as 
a rather ordinary set of men; but Campbell's ringing verses (p. 
341) 

"Ye mariners of England 
That guard our native seas!" 

rouse us to a different idea of them, — an idea justified by naval 
history. 

Nothing is more fatal to poetry than to have these imaginings 
false; once the poet has proclaimed them, they must ring true, — 
true at least to some aspects of the subject, at some time, under 
the right circumstances; if not the whole truth, j^et true as far as 
they go. And this truth must, for poetry, be of a kind that stirs 
our feelings; that moves us to delight, laughter, sympathy, 
horror, anger, patriotism, reverence. Here, again, the emotion 
must be genuine; a pretended emotion trumped up for its own 
sake is sentimentality. The reader who thinks poetry is senti- 
mental or "slushy" should turn to Suckling's ''Encouragement 
to a Lover" (p. 162) or Cunningham's "A wet sheet and a flowing 
sea" (p. 340) or Mickle's "The Sailor's Wife" (p. 269). The 
sailor's wife is far from sentimental when she exclaims 

"There's twa fat hens upo' the coop 
Been fed this month and mair; 
Mak' haste and thraw their necks about 
That Colin weel may fare," — 



LYRIC POETRY 7 

she's undoubtedly glad to get Colin home again, and is showing 
it in a very natural way. 

There are various ways in which the power of seeing beyond 
the fact is expressed in the poet's style. Figures of speech, for 
instance, must not be thought of as ornaments, added to the 
poem, but as ways of making more clear or more intense, by 
suggested comparisons, the poet's real meaning. For instance, 
when Marvel, in his "Song of the Emigrants in Bermuda" (p. 
193), tells us that God 

" — hangs in shades the orange bright 
Like golden lamps in a green night," 

or when Wordsworth says of Milton (p. 350) 

" Thy soul was like a Star, and dwelt apart," 

we feel more vividly the beauty of the orange-grove and the 
loftiness of Milton's spirit. Shakespeare's sonnets are full of such 
comparisons, or similes. His imagination often seized on a hke- 
ness which could be carried out in detail, as in these lines (p. 63) : 

"Like as the waves make toward the pebbled shore, 
So do our minutes hasten to their end; 
Each changing place with that which goes before, 
In sequent toil all forwards do contend." 

Here we get not merely the apt comparison of the passage of 
time with waves following one after another and disappearing, 
but also the quick pen-picture of the hurry of waves crowding 
each other up the beach, — a picture that intensifies the idea of 
the rapid passing of the minutes. 

When one thing is not merely compared to another, but spoken 
of as if it were that other, we have the figure known as metaphor. 
This, if the meaning is not obscure, is a more forcible figure than 
simile, as it enables the poet to put his idea in a condensed, 
almost telegraphic, form. When Keats says (d. 333) 

"When I behold upon the night's starr'd face, 
Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance 
And think that I may never Uve to trace 
Their shadows," 



8 INTRODUCTION 

we pass over almost without notice the suggestion of the night 
being a real creature with a "face, " and seize upon the wonderful 
thought of the clouds on a starry night being for Keats so full 
of romantic visions, of which his poems were merely shadows, 
that he would never be able to write them all. 

A comparison, whether metaphor or simile, may run on to 
some length, as in Waller's "Go, lovely Rose" (p. 150) or Drum- 
mond's "Of this fair volume which we World do name" (p. 99). 
In such cases, the poet may greatly strengthen his effect, by the 
aptness with which the two ideas continue to parallel each other; 
there is danger, however, that we may think more of his clever- 
ness and ingenuity than the importance of his thought. 

Another frequently used figure is pcrso7iificaHon, by which 
objects of nature, or mere abstractions of qualities, are spoken of 
as if they had life and personality. The first line in the book 
personifies Spring, as "the year's pleasant king." Shakespeare 
speaks of "that churl, Death," and "Captive Good attending 
Captain 111"; Milton, of "Laughter, holding both his sides." 
It is fatally easy to slip into the habit of merely spelling abstract 
nouns with capitals, without imagining them transformed into 
persons at all; "printer's-devil personification," as it has been 
called. Gray is sometimes guilty of this, as in the lines (p. 275) : 

"Where grateful Science still adores 
Her Henry's holy shade." 

In true personification, the thing personified really appears to 
Hve. Shelley's "Night" (p. 320) is besought to 

"Wrap thy form in a mantle gray, 
Star-inwrought : 
Blind with thine hair the eyes of Day," 

and later we hear of his "brother Death," and his "sweet child 
Sleep, the filmy-eyed." 

Another poetic device, not exactly a figure of speech, but allied 
to them, is the pretty pretense known as the pastoral. In poems 
of this kind, everyone is thought of as a shc]:)her(l, in a sort of 
golden age of simplicity; with nothing to do but sit in the shade 



LYRIC POETRY 9 

watching the sheep, playing on rustic instruments of music, sing- 
ing songs, or making love. This convention goes back to ancient 
Greek times, when people who had become tired of artificial city 
hfe turned with delight to the fresh shepherd poems of Theocritus, 
from the mountains of Sicily. The modern pastoral is usually 
sheer artifice: we don't need to be told that Marlowe's Passionate 
Shepherd (p. 38) is no Enghsh sheep-tender, when he ofifers his love 

"Fair linM slippers for the cold 
With buckles of the purest gold," 

as well as silver dishes on an ivory table. Milton (p. 120) speaks 
of his dead friend as Lycidas, a shepherd, when we very well 
know his real name was Edward King, and he was a college stu- 
dent preparing for the ministry. Artificial as the pastoral seems 
at first, we come to recognize it as a graceful and often a beauti- 
ful device, specially fit for somewhat formal poems of compli- 
ment, of regret, or of bereavement. 

The pastoral is sometimes hard to distinguish from the poem 
really descriptive of country life; the two shade into each other. 

A further characteristic of poetic thought is the ability of poets 
to put some universal human observation or ideal into such a 
striking phrase as to satisfy the race that it is the one best and 
permanent expression for that thought. So we get our so-called 
"quotations," the lines everybody knows, without perhaps know- 
ing where they come from; such as 

"Full many a flower is born to blush unseen." {Gray, p. 259) 
"I could not love Thee, dear, so much 

Loved I not honour more." {Lovelace, p. 146) 

" We carved not a line and we raised not a stone, 

But we left him alone with his glory." {Wolfe, p. 357) 

"Beauty is truth, truth beauty." {Keats, p. 473) 

— "old, unhappy far-off things 

And battles long ago." {Wordsworth, p. 412) 

What has been said so far applies, in the main, to all poetry. 
A lyric poem is distinguished from all other kinds by being short, 



10 INTRODUCTION 

and by expressing not a story (as does an epic or a ballad) nor 
a conflict of different persons' wills (as does a drama), but a 
single idea, mood, or feeling of the poet himself. It is also dis- 
tinguished (as the title of the book suggests) by being singable. 
Many lyrics, indeed, in this collection were written originally for 
tunes; and a great age of lyric verse will always be a music- 
loving age. Such was the age of Ehzabeth and the half-century 
following; an age when everybody sang or played some instru- 
ment. Shakespeare's characters are always singing; some of his 
plays, like Twelfth Night, are almost musical comedy. The 
original music of many of these songs from plays, and others 
included in this volume, has been traced, and can be found in 
Elson's Shakespeare in Music; and some of them have been 
set to music by later composers as many as a score of times. 
Many popular songs will be found among the later poems; songs 
hke "Rule Britannia" (p. 213), "Sally in our Alley" (p. 229), 
"Ye banks and braes o' bonnie Doon" (p. 237), "I arise from 
dreams of Thee" (p. 302). Many others were clearly written 
with a tune in mind. Burns's favorite method of composing was 
to select a popular Scotch air, and then write words to fit. Even 
lyrics which do not seem to have a tune in them are written for 
the ear, not for the eye; Scott used to compose while riding 
horseback; Tennyson and Wordsworth would half recite, half 
chant their poems while walking. So to get the real spirit of 
these poems, we must either sing them or read them aloud rhyth- 
mically. 

The pleasure to be gained from poetry is more than doubled 
if one understands the technique of versification: just as the 
pleasure of watching a game of ball depends on knowing the rules 
of the game. The student is therefore urged to master the 
following simple rules of poetic technique. 

The fundamental feature of verse, as of music, is rhythm. 
Rhythm is an arrangement of a series of sounds, or objects, or 
figures, at regular intervals, in a repeating pattern. In studying 
design, pupils early learn the use of rhythm in oriental rug- 
borders or in wall-paper or embroidery. In music, rhythm 
appears in the "time," or the way the notes are marked off into 



LYRIC POETRY 11 

measures, each with its proper number of full or half or quarter 
notes. So in architecture, a cathedral is marked off by a regular 
series of pillars and arches, each section being equivalent to each 
other; the carvings, also, are arranged in series, rhythmically. 
This is why Ruskin could call architecture "frozen music." 

In poetry, the rhythm depends on the way the voice is thrown 
on certain syllables,^ marking out the ones that, as it were, "carry 
the tune," and slighting the others. The various rhythms are 
classified (1) by the number of strong accents or stresses in the 
line, (2) by the way each strong syllable is hnked with one or 
more light ones or pauses (like rests, in music) to make up a 
"foot," as we call the repeating group of syllables. 

To take some of the familiar poems of The Golden Treasury, we 
find: 

Two-stress (dimeter) 

He is gone on the mountain. 
He is lost to the forest, 
Like a summer-dried fountain, 
When our need was the sorest. 

Three-stress (trimeter) ('^'°"' P' ^^°^ 

John Anderson, my jo, John 
When we were first acquent 
Your locks were like the raven, 
Your bonnie brow was brent. 

Four-stress (tetrameter) ^^'''''''' ^' ^^^^ 

How sleep the brave, who sink to rest 
By all their country's wishes blest! 

(Collins, p. 220) 

* Pupils who have studied Latin poetry should not confuse this 
stress, or natural emphasis, with the vowel-quantity which determines 
the rules of Latin verse. There is "quantity" in English verse, 
which occasionally is important; but it is rather obscure and will be 
passed over as not essential in elementary study. 



12 INTRODUCTION 

Five-stress (pentameter) 

The curfew tolls the knell of parting day, 
The lowing herd winds slowly o'er the lea, 

Six-stress (hexameter) 

And bid the weltering waves their oozy channels keep. 

(Milton, p. 107) 
Seven-stress (heptameter) 

There's not a joy the world can give like that it takes away 
When the glow of early thought declines in feeling's dull decay; 

(Byron, p. 364) 

Turning to the arrangement of strong (or stressed) and light 
syllables within the line, we find in most of the foregoing examples 
that the syllable that carries the tune is preceded by a light one, 
this arrangement being repeated enough times to make up the 
line. If we indicate this by marking the light syllables with a 
cross, X, and cutting the pairs of syllables apart by upright bars, 
so as to show how the pattern repeats, we shall have 

The cur | few tolls | the knell | of part 1 ing day, 

This movement (x ') is called iambic; it is the commonest rhythm 
in English verse. When the accent is reversed, so that the light 
syllable follows the strong one (' x) it is called trochaic; as. 

Art thou I poor, yet | hast thou | golden | slumbers? 

(Dekker, p. 96) 

Sometimes two light syllables, instead of one, are associated with 
a strong one. When the light ones come first (xx '), we have 
anapaestic movement: 

When repos 1 ing that night 1 on my pal 1 let of straw 
By the wolf- | scaring fag | got that guard | ed the slain, 

(Campbell, p. 437) 

When two light syllables follow the strong one (' xx), the verse 
is dactylic: 



LYRIC POETRY 13 



Fast they come, | fast they come; 

'X X 'X 

See how they | gather! 

(Scott, p. 339) 

These are the chief rhythms of Enghsh verse; but the poets 
seldom or never carry them out in a purely mechanical fashion, 
any more than a musician tries to play exactly like a pianola. 
For the sake of throwing emphasis on an important word, or of 
changing the time, for the moment, to suit the thought, or of 
making a significant pause at the end or the middle of a hne, 
or merely of lightness and variety of touch, the poet may do one 
of three things : 

(1) Add or insert an extra light syllable: 

X X' XX' XX' X X'X 

In the down | hill of life [ when I find | I'm declin | ing, 

(Collins, p. 288) 

X ' X ' X 'XX ' 

The nect | arine | and cur | ious peach 

(Marvel, p. 179) 

(2) Omit a light syllable or more, leaving pauses or "rests" to 
fill out the meter: 

'X 'X 'X 'X 

Souls of I Poets I dead and | gone, o 

'X'X X 'X 

What E I lysium | have ye | known, o 

'X 'X 'X'X 

Happy, I field or | mossy | cavern 
Choicer | than the | Mermaid 1 Tavern? 

(Keats, p. 371) 

X' X' X' X'X' X' 

The fields | o breathe | o sweet, the dais | ies kiss | our feet, 

X'X'X 'X ' X' X' 

o Young I o lov I ers meet, | old wives | a-sun | ning sit. 

(Nash, p. 33) 

X'X' X ' X ' 

O what 1 can ail | thee, knight- [ at-arms, 

X ' X ' X'X' 

Alone I and pale | ly loit | ering? 

X ' X'X ' X ' 

The sedge | has with | er'd from | the lake 

X ' X ' X ' 

And no | o birds | o sing. 

(Keats, p. 326) 



14 INTRODUCTION 

(3) Throw the accent in an unexpected place, as by introduc- 
ing a trochaic foot into an iambic Hne. This is most commonly 
done after a pause, as at the beginning of a new line, or a new 
thought: 

' X X ' X 'X ' 

Pack, clouds, | away, | and wel | come day. 

(Hey wood, p. 89) 

X ' X'X' X ' 'XX' 

Then blooms | o each | o thing, | then maids | dance in | a ring. 

(Nash, p. 33) 

Aside from these easily recognized variations of rhythm, English 
words vary so much in their accent that we have not a 
sharp division into light and strong syllables, but a series of 
many gradations, from almost no sound at all, to a heavy stress. 
Sometimes the stress will be sharp and clear cut, as in 

" Waken, lords and ladies gay, 
On the mountain dawns the day; 
All the jolly chase is here 
With hawk and horse and hunting spear." 

(Scott, p. 391) 

Sometimes the stress is so evenly placed as to leave in doubt 
whether one syllable is heavier than another. This gives an 
even, slow movement, full of dignity; as in Sidney's hne (p. 78); 

"With how sad steps, O Moon, thou climbst the skies!" 

Sometimes one accent seems to be demanded by the verse, another 
by the sense, with the claims so evenly divided that the accent is 
said to "hover" between the two. Of the following lines, the 
first begins with an accent clearly reversed: the second, with 
hovering accent. 

" Never did sun more beautifully steep 
In his first splendour valley, rock, or hill." 

(Wo7-dsworth, p. 404) 

These, and other variations, form to the trained ear one of the 
chief delights of versification. The poet, however, must not 
introduce so many of them as to leave any doubt as to what is 



LYRIC POETRY 15 

the fundamental rhythm from which he is varying. And the 
variations must not be due to carelessness or lack of skill, but 
must be such as to strengthen the beauty and effectiveness of the 
verse. 

The largest unit of verse-form is the stanza, a group of lines 
bound together by some systematic scheme, and usually by the 
rime. The simplest group, two equal lines riming, is called a 
couplet. Marvell's " Song of the Emigrants in Bermuda" (p. 193) 
is written in couplets. Lines grouped in threes are called triplets 
or tercets. They may be unrimed, or rimed; of equal or unequal 
length; as in the following: 

"I have had playmates, I have had companions, 
In my days of childhood, in my joyful schooldays; 
All, ail are gone, the old familiar faces." 

{Lamb, p. 361) 

" Whenas in silks my Julia goes 
Then, then (methinks) how sweetly flows 
That liquefaction of her clothes." 

(Herrick, p. 156) 
" Whoe'er she be, 
That not impossible She 
That shall command my heart and me — " 

{Crashaw, p. 137) 

A group of four lines makes a quatrain; the most frequent 
arrangement being the ''ballad meter," or "common meter" of 
the hymn-books, with four feet in the first and third lines (which 
may rime) and three feet in the second and fourth (which must 
rime). Examples are Herrick's "Gather ye Rosebuds" (p. 145), 
and Campbell's "Lord Ulhn's Daughter" (p. 310). There are 
many other arrangements, both as to length of line and rime. 
When we get more than four Hues in the stanza, there are various 
combinations in frequent use, and an almost countless number 
that have been tried by individual poets; many of them are 
analyzed in standard books on versification. The student will 
find much interest in the ingenuity of poets in inventing new 
stanza forms, and the unexpected beauties resulting. The more 



16 INTRODUCTION 

complex the stanza is, the more it depends on rime to bind the 
parts together, and to make clear the structure. 

Rime is likeness of sound in words, a likeness which must 
include the last accented vowel and all of the word that follows 
it. It is the sound, not the spelling, that counts; so we find 
Wordsworth (p. 416) riming cloud — crowd, hills — daffodils, 
trees — breeze. If the final syllable is not accented, the rime 
must go back to the last one that is accented. Byron (p. 301) 
rimes daughters — waters, causing — pausing, gleaming — dream- 
ing; and Hood (p. 373) rimes unfortunate — importunate, 
tenderly — slenderly. But the likeness in sound must not go 
further back than the last accented vowel, or we have not rime, 
but identity — even if the speHing differs. Thus sec is not a 
good rime for sea. In studying verse, it is convenient to indicate 
lines that rime by the same letter, as a, b, or c, and lines that 
do not rime, by x. Thus the rime scheme of Wordsworth's 
" Daffodils " (p. 416) would be described as ababcc; the rime 
scheme of Campbell's " Hohenlinden " (p. 351) as aaax. 

Two of the more complex forms of verse are so important in 
English poetry, and so well represented in this collection, as to 
need special note. These are the sonnet and the ode. 

The sonnet always has just fourteen lines, of the same length 
and rhythm, five iambic feet. The rime scheme varies, according 
to whether the poet is following strictly the model of the Italian 
sonnet (from which ours was originally taken) or the freer form 
used by Shakespeare and the writers of his time. The Italian 
sonnet divides the fourteen lines into two groups, the octave 
(eight lines) and the sestet (six Hnes). The octave has only two 
rimes, arranged abbaabba, the sestet may have two or three, 
arranged in any of a variety of waj's, the preferred schemes 
being cdecde, cdcdcd, cdedce, and cddcee. The thought should be 
such that while there is but one central idea, it is presented in 
one light in the octave, in another in the sestet. This is a diffi- 
cult, rather formal verse; but fine and dignified, when well 
handled. Very noble examples are Milton's sonnet " On his 
Blindness" (p. 130), and Wordsworth's on Milton (p. 350). 

The Shakespearian sonnet is divided into three quatrains and a 



LYRIC POETRY 17 

couplet. The quatrains take up an idea or a question and present 
it in several different lights, — perhaps by a succession of different 
comparisons; the couplet binds the whole poem into a unit by 
phrasing aptly the poet's conclusion, explanation, or fundamental 
thought. One of the best of this type is Shakespeare's 

"When in disgrace with fortune and men's eye," (p. 45). 

The ode is a long form of poem, taken over from the Greek 
poets, especially Pindar. Originally, the Greek odes, which 
were chanted or sung by a chorus, to the accompaniment of music 
and stately dancing, were divided into three sections. The first 
two (called strophe and antistrophe) had to be ahke in meter, as 
the singers moved to one side during the strophe, and back dur- 
ing the antistrophe. They stood still during the third section, or 
epode, whi(^h accordingly did not have to match the others in 
meter. In English odes, the three divisions are sometimes 
called turn, counter-turn, and stand. They may be seen in 
Gray's "The Progress of Poetry" (p. 238), w^here the first strophe 
or turn begins 

"Awake, Aeolian lyre, awake," 

the first antistrophe or counter-turn, 

"Oh Sovereign of the willing soul! " 

and the first epode or stand, 

"Thee the voice, the dance obey," 

after which comes the second strophe, 

"Man's feeble race what ills await! " 

Most English odes, however, do not follow this pattern, the name 
being loosely applied to any long poem, with no fixed length of 
line or stanza and no regularity to the rime except that every 
line finds an answering rime somewhere. It is a form especially 
suited to recitation on public occasions, and to the expression of 
important and dignified thought. 

So much for the mechanics of verse. The real art of poetry 



18 INTRODUCTION 

consists in filling these forms with words which are beautiful in 
themselves and which by their sound suggest the poet's thought. 
This art of selecting words for their sound is known as tone-color. 
Sometimes tone-color lies in the repetition of a single letter at 
the beginning of the stressed syllables, as the b in the lines 

"Ye banks and braes o' bonnie Doon 
How can ye bloom sae fair! " 

This is known as alliteration. It used to be the chief element 
of English verse, before rime became popular; but now poets use 
it only sparingly; when it is too prominent, it seems tricky and 
artificial. A more subtle beauty comes from hiding the repeated 
letter in the middle of the word, Hke the I and the d in the follow- 
ing lines : 

" By shallow rivers, to whose falls 
Melodious birds sing madrigals." 

(Marlowe, p. 38) 

These lines are particularly musical because the vowels and con- 
sonants are all such as flow into each other without jarring. 
A careful writer will avoid harsh letters, hke s; as Tennyson 
said, he will "kick the geese out of the boat; " but a great master 
of verse can make even a line full of s's beautiful, like 
Shakespeare's 

" When to the sessions of sweet silent thought 
I summon up remembrance of things past." 

The fitting of sound to meaning can be seen very plainly in 
Dryden's "Alexander's Feast" (p. 199), where the bard's songs, 
now of victory and feasting, now of love, now of vengeance, are 
imitated in the verse. In Cowper's "Loss of the Royal George" 
(p. 226) we feel the solemn, bell-like echo of the o and the a in 

"Toll for the Brave, 
The brave that are no more! " 

And we feel the whirling of the autumn wind, and the rattle of 
dry leaves, in Keats's lines (p. 463): 



FRANCIS TURNER PALGRAVE 19 

"Thou from whose unseen presence the leaves dead 
Are driven like ghosts from an enchanter fleeing, 
Yellow and black and pale and hectic red, 
Pestilence stricken multitudes." 

The same art is heard in Milton's 

"I hear the far-off curfew sound 
Over some wide watered shore. 
Swinging slow with sullen roar." (p. 189). 

And more subtly, in Shakespeare's 

"Beauty making beautiful old rhyme. 
In praise of ladies dead." 

But the appreciation of the tone-color is not a thing that can 
be learned in a moment; it grows with our knowledge of good 
poetry, and is one of the rewards of continued study. 



FRANCIS TURNER PALGRAVE 

1824-1897 

Palgrave's boyhood was such as to develop and refine in him a 
natural taste for the finer things of literature, which was to lead 
to The Golden Treasury. His father, for whom he was named, 
was a historical scholar of repute, who had been a friend of 
Southey, Scott, and Macaulay. His mother, when he came home 
from school, used to read to him from Dante, or the Faerie Queen, 
when he was not acting out with his nearest brother scenes from 
Homer. We hear of the two boys beginning Caesar at seven, 
and ''to their great delight " Homer and Horace at eleven, besides 
being interested in models and inventions. The family were 
also deeply religious. His brother, Gifford, later became a 
Jesuit missionary and a great traveler in unknown and danger- 
ous parts of the East. 

As a student at Oxford, Palgrave devoted his spare time to 
literature and art, filling his rooms with prints of famous works 
by Turner, Michael Angelo, and Correggio. He was known also 



20 INTRODUCTION 

for his gift of attracting about him many friends of similar tastes. 
He took his degree in 1847, with a "first" in Classics, having 
dropped out of college for a year (1846) to serve as private secre- 
tary to Gladstone. 

After a year as Fellow of Exeter College, he entered on what 
was t^be his profession for thirty-five years, as an official in the 
Edi^ation Office of the Privy Council, first as Examiner, later as 
Assistant Secretary; acting for a few years as Vice Principal of 
a trainiiTg sclrool for teachers. Several times his friends urged 
him to become a candidate for the Professorship of Poetry at 
Oxford. Once he had come forward for the post, but withdrew 
his name in favor of his friend the well known scholar, J. C. 
Shairp. It is pleasant to know that when the chair again became 
vacant in 1885, another friend, Matthew Arnold, refused to 
present himself so that the Professorship might go to Palgrave. 
He held it for twelve years, until his death in 1897. 

Besides Gladstone, Shairp, and Arnold, Palgrave knew many 
of the notable men of his age, being drawn to them by a common 
appreciation of the finest things in art and literature. He was 
a friend of Thackeray, Carlyle, Browning, the painter Holman 
Hunt, the sculptor Woolner. His friendship with Tennyson, 
lasting for forty-three years, he spoke of as "one of the chief est 
influences in his life." In 1859, when he was thirty-five and 
Tennyson fifty-one, Palgrave went on a walking-trip with Tenny- 
son, Woolner, and others through Cornwall, the "King Arthur 
Country," which Tennyson had just been writing about in the 
Idylls of the King. On this romantic trip, plans were made for 
The Golden Treasury, which Palgrave completed within the 
next year and a half. He received much help and encouragement 
from Tennyson, who read over with him the entire collection, 
making valuable suggestions. 

Palgrave brought out various other collections of verse: a 
Children's Treasury, a Treasury of Sacred Song, editions of 
Herrick, Keats, Wordsworth, and Tennyson, of Shakespeare's 
Songs and Sonnets; and finally, in the last year of his life, a 
continuation of The Golden Treasury comprising poems written 
after 1830. He also wrote several books of original verse, includ- 



CRITICAL OPINIONS 21 

ing a volume of hymns and one of historical poems, called 
Visions of England. His poems are thoughtful, and careful in 
style and versification, but are not widely read. He tried his 
hand at a love-story, Preciosa, and a book of children's tales. 
The Five Days Entertainments at Went worth Grange. For^ome 
years, he was art critic on the Saturday Review, and puBjBgd 
some essays in this field. Some of his Oxford lectures ^m-e 
expanded into a book under the title, Landscape i^PM^y from 
Homer to Tennyson. But Palgrave's chief tal^|jp!||y not M 
rtiuch in original writing as in a fine and highly drained appreci- 
ation of the best that others had done; the gift that made him the 
welcome companion of the great writers of his times, and that 
enabled him to compile, in his early manhood, that collection of 
the best English lyrics which has indeed proved a ''golden 
treasury." 

The story of his charming family life, his friendships, and his 
hterary career is told by his daughter, Miss GwenlUan F. Pal- 
grave, in her book Francis Turner Palgrave: his Journals and 
Memories of his Life London, 1899. 



CRITICAL OPINIONS OF THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

"The judgment of two generations has not only confirmed 
the long series of judgments upon English poets and poetry 
which Professor Palgrave's work involved, but has accepted that 
work as a kind of original creation. The book is one of the 
English classics; and its quality and place are so marked and 
distinct that we have come to think of it as a contribution to 
Enghsh literature. Its individuahty lies, however, entirely in 
the insight, the critical discernment and the taste which it illus- 
trates. These are so nearly infallible that the mass of other 
men's work collected in The Golden Treasury to which Pro- 
fessor Palgrave added not a line of his own, seems somehow to 
belong to the editor." 

Hamilton W. Mahie 

{The Bookman, 6: 470: Jan., 1908) 



22 INTRODUCTION 

"Using the poems of others, Palgrave has made a mosaic of 
his own, — a work of design and creative art. Many other collec- 
tions exist which contain the same poems and masses of equal 
work. But in all these the pieces are ill arranged; they are 
chaotically heaped; they swear at each other; they have no 
general effect. But in Palgrave's work, so true is the tone from 
beginning to end, so absolute the harmony, that the poems help 
each other with reflected lustre; they deepen each other's notes 
with choral echo. This effect has been produced by ruthless 
suppression of much of the mightiest lyric poetry of the language. 
. . . The fierce expressions of love, of revolt, of despair, — 
ecstatic visions or opium dreams, — nothing of these is here. 
And what is the result? The book brings up before us a perfect 
image of that England which we all keep in our thoughts, — the 
image of a land of rich woods and long-tamed fields of flowery 
hedges and rose-fronted cottages, of war-cradled castles and 
pensive homes of fame. No stain is on the picture, which is one 
of ordered splendor and secluded peace." 

Charles Leonard Moore 

{The Dial, 31: 175. Sept., 1901) 



"It is not possible here to escape from the noblest, the most 
distinguished, the loveliest English poetry; and there is nothing, 
or scarcely anything, which does not reach perfection in its own 
line. This little green book . . . has been the companion, 
the teacher, the guide, philosopher, and friend of every English 
verse- writer born, let us say, since 1840. Who shall dare to esti- 
mate how valuable have been the splendour and purity of its 
contents in holding up the tradition of a great style in English 

^^^^^^^ " (Saturday Review, Sept. 19, 1896, p. 312) 



"It may be questioned whether, after Arnold, any other critic 
of our time contributed so much to educate public taste where in 
this country it most needs such education. ... He had no 
taint of vulgarity, of charlatanism, of insincerity. He never 



HOW TO TEACH THE GOLDEN TREASURY 23 

talked or wrote the cant of the chques or of the multitude. He 
understood and loved what was excellent, he had no toleration 
for what was common or second rate; he was not of the crowd. 
... In the best and most comprehensive sense of the term, he 
was a man of classical temper, taste, and culture, and had all the 
insight and discernment, all the instincts and sympathies which 
are the result of such qualifications." 

Professor Charlton Collins (Quoted in Miss 
Palgrave's Journals and Memories, p. 25.) 



HOW TO TEACH THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

A collection of poems like this is by no means to be taught 
through from cover to cover, like an arithmetic. It is no matter 
if the pupils read no more than half or quarter, or even fewer, of 
the poems, provided they gain an intelligent appreciation of those 
they do read. Neither should poetry be made an occasion for 
the teaching of all sorts of extraneous things, — literary history, 
biography, or gossip, rhetorical principles, "notes," or even too 
much of the technique of verse, except as these definitely help 
in the appreciation of the verses under consideration. There 
should be much reading aloud and reciting, by both pupils and 
teacher; good oral rendering is the final test of one's real grasp of 
a poem. The spirit of the recitation should always be not that 
of fulfiUing a task, or of acquiring useful information, but of 
appreciative enjoyment, and the desire to communicate that 
enjoyment to others. 

It may be assumed that every member of the class has already 
a fund of verse-memories, — Mother Goose rimes; hymns and 
songs; bits from Stevenson's Chil(Vs Garden, from Longfellow 
and Whittier and Tennyson; perhaps much more. A good first 
lesson, to open up the general subject, would be to ask every 
pupil to run rapidly through the book, marking any poems that 
are old favorites, and be ready to read one or more of them aloud 
well enough to interest the class. This will bring a much greater 
response than one recitation provides time for. The natural 



24 INTRODUCTION 

step then will be to run through the book for different kinds of 
subjects that have interested poets; to see how different poets 
have felt about nature, about patriotism, about love, about 
death. By the fourth or fifth lesson, it will be possible to take 
up technical questions of versification, pretty much as treated in 
the foregoing pages, which may be divided into parts suited to the 
maturity of the class. The illustrative quotations in these pages 
have been chosen partly with a view of interesting pupils in 
some of the finest poems, and those most likely to appeal to them. 
In preparing a lesson, pupils should look up the complete poem, 
trace through it the technical element described, and try to find 
the same thing elsewhere. The test must always be the sound: 
can the pupil convince the class by his rendering of the poem, that 
his understanding of its thought and rhythm is correct? After 
perhaps a couple of weeks of technical study, the class should 
spend the rest of the available time on some special subject. 
This may be (1) a more thorough study of selected types of 
poetry, as the song for music, the sonnet, the pastoral, the ode; 

(2) a review of the chief historical periods of English lyric verse ; or 

(3) special study of a few leading poets (such as those named in 
the list of the College Entrance Requirements for eastern colleges) 
with the aim of learning to distinguish their individualities, their 
views of life, their artistic method. 

Of special teaching devices, the best is reading aloud, provided 
it is done not in a mechanical or indifferent way, but with an 
earnest effort to get the poet's thought and express it to the 
hearers. It is assumed that the pupil has access to a dictionary 
and a handbook of mythology, if he needs them; and that he will 
refer to the notes, not for all that might be said for complete 
understanding of the poem, but for what may help towards an 
imaginative grasp of the main thought. There should be much 
memorizing — some of the formal kind, more of the unconscious 
kind that will grow out of constant cross-references in class- 
room discussion. Illustration or quotation from other collections 
of poetry should be encouraged; a profitable scheme is for each 
pupil to start a scrap book of newspaper and magazine verse, 
noting opposite each chpping what it was selected for, — the 



BOOKS FOR FURTHER STUDY 25 

idea, the rhythm, the stanza form, the imagery, or what. If 
possible, have the class learn the tunes and sing some of the 
lyrics, such as the Shakespeare songs. Those who care to, should 
be encouraged to try their hands at original verse; indeed Prof. 
Brander Mathews recommends this as an excellent way to learn 
to write prose. But the best devices will be those invented by 
a teacher who loves the subject; and the best results will be the 
often unexpressed desire to know more of our great poetry. 



BOOKS FOR FURTHER STUDY 

First of all, the school hbrary should have some of the standard 
collections, like The Oxford Book of English Verse, Miss Wiggin's 
Golden Numbers, and Stedman's Victorian Anthology and Ameri- 
can Anthology, and Ward's English Poets, as well as The Golden 
Treasury, Part Second. There are also many good special col- 
lections of poems grouped by centuries, or by verse forms, — 
sonnets, odes, and others. For verse form, the most readable 
book is Brander Mathews' A Study of Versification; the most 
compact and inclusive. Bright and Miller's Elements of English 
Versification; the most concise treatment of the whole field is 
Francis B. Gummere's Handbook of Poetics. Raymond M. Alden's 
English Verse gives a scholarly discussion of the siibject with 
numerous well-chosen examples. Max Kaluza's Short History of 
English Versification translated by A. C. Dunstan, traces the 
historical changes in our verse-forms. E. C. Stedman's Nature 
and Elements of Poetry discusses certain general questions of 
poetic art. G. L. Raymond's Poetry as a Representative Art is 
controversial, but very suggestive, especially as regards oral 
interpretation. Percival Chubb 's The Teaching of English, 
especially Chapter 8, will be found of much value. The music 
for many poems in this book will be found in L. C. Elson's Shake- 
speare in Music, J. C. Dick's The Songs of Robert Burns and in 
The Laurel Song Book. 



Et$ rbv Xei/xQva Ka6l<ras^ edpeirev ^repop icf)'' eripip 
alp6fjLevos dypev/x'' dvd^wv ado/x^vif. i/'i'X^ — 



TO ALFRED TENNYSON 
POET LAUREATE 

This book in its progress has recalled often to my memory a 
man with whose friendship we were once honoured, to whom no 
region of English Literature was unfamiliar, and who, whilst 
rich in all the noble gifts of Nature was most eminentl}^ distin- 
guished by the noblest and the rarest, — just judgment and 
high-hearted patriotism. It would have been hence a peculiar 
pleasure and pride to dedicate what I have endeavoured to make 
a true national Anthology of three centuries to Henry Hallam. 
But he is beyond the reach of any human tokens of love and 
reverence; and I desire therefore to place before it a name 
united with his by associations which whilst Poetry retains her 
hold on the minds of Englishmen are not likely to be forgotten. 

Your encouragement, given while traversing the wild scenery 
of Treryn Dinas, led me to begin the work: and it has been 
completed under your advice and assistance. For the favour 
now asked I have thus a second reason: and to this I may add, 
the homage which is your right as Poet, and the gratitude due 
to a Friend, whose regard I rate at no common value. 

Permit me, then, to inscribe to yourself a book which I hope 
may be found by many a lifelong fountain of innocent and exalted 
pleasure; a source of animation to friends when they meet; and 
able to sweeten solitude itself with best society, — with the 
companionship of the wise and the good, with the beauty which 
the eye can not see, and the music only heard in silence. If 
this collection proves a storehouse of delight to Labour and to 
Poverty — if it teaches those indifferent to the Poets to love 
them, and those who love them to love them more, the aim and 
the desire entertained in framing it will be fully accomplished. 
May, 1861. F. T. P. 

27 



PREFACE 



BY FRANCIS TURNER PALGRAVE 

This little Collection differs, it is believed, from others in the 
attempt made to include in it all the best Original Lyrical pieces 
and Songs in our language, by writers not living, — and none 
beside the best. Many familiar verses will hence be met with; 
many also which should be familiar: — the Editor will regard 
as his fittest readers those who love Poetry so well, that he can 
offer them nothing not already known and valued. 

The Editor is acquainted with no strict and exhaustive defini- 
tion of Lyrical Poetry; but he has found the task of practical 
decision increase in clearness and in facility as he advanced with 
his work, whilst keeping in view a few simple principles. Lyrical 
has been here held essentially to imply that each Poem shall 
turn on some single thought, feeling, or situation. In accordance 
with this, narrative, descriptive, and didactic poems — unless 
accompanied by rapidity of movement, brevity, and the colour- 
ing of human passion — have been excluded. Humourous 
poetry, except in the very unfrequent instances where a truly 
poetical tone pervades the whole, with what is strictly personal, 
occasional, and religious, has been considered foreign to the idea 
of the book. Blank verse and the ten-syllable couplet with all 
pieces markedly dramatic, have been rejected as alien from 
what is commonly understood by Song, and rarely conforming 
to Lyrical conditions in treatment. But it is not anticipated, 
nor is it possible, that all readers shall think the line accurately 
drawn. Some poems, as Gray's Elegy, the Allegro and Penseroso, 
Wordsworth's Ruth or Campbell's Lord Ullin, might be claimed 
with perhaps equal justice for a narrative or descriptive selec- 
tion: whilst with reference especially to Ballads and Sonnets, 

29 



30 PREFACE 

the Editor can only state that he has taken his utmost pains to 
decide without caprice or partiality. 

This also is all he can plead in regard to a point even more 
liable to question : what degree of merit should give rank among 
the Best. That a Poem shall be worthy of the writer's genius 

— that it shall reach a perfection commensurate with its aim — 
that we should require finish in proportion to brevity — that 
passion, colour, and originahty cannot atone for serious imper- 
fections in clearness, unity, cr truth — that a few good lines do 
not make a good poem — that popular estimate is serviceable 
as a guidepost more than as a compass — above all, that excel- 
lence should be looked for rather in the Whole than in the Parts 

— such and other such canons have been always steadily 
regarded. He may, however, add that the pieces chosen, and a 
far larger number rejected, have been carefully and repeatedly 
considered; and that he has been aided throughout by two 
friends of independent and exercised judgment, besides the 
distinguished person addressed in the Dedication. It is hoped 
that by this procedure the volume has been freed from that 
one-sidedness which must beset individual decisions : — but for 
the final choice the Editor is alone responsible. 

It would obviously have been invidious to apply the standard 
aimed at in this Collection to the Living. Not even in the cases 
where this might be done without offense, does it appear wise 
to attempt to anticipate the verdict of the future or our contem- 
poraries. Should the book last, poems by Tennyson, Bryant, 
Clare, Lowell, and others, will no doubt claim and obtain their 
place among the best. But the Editor trusts that this will be 
effected by other bards, and in days far distant. Chalmers' 
vast Collection, with the whole works of all accessible poets not 
contained in it, and the best Anthologies of different periods, 
have been twice systematically read through: and it is hence 
improbable that any omissions which may be regretted are due 
to oversight. The poems are printed entire, except in a very 
few instances (specified in the notes) where a stanza has been 
omitted. The omissions have been risked only when the piece 
could be thus brought to a closer lyrical unity: and, as essen- 



PREFACE 31 

tially opposed to this unity, extracts, obviously such, are excluded. 
In regard to the text, the purpose of the book has appeared to 
justify the choice of the most poetical version, wherever more 
than one exists: and much labour has been given to present 
each poem, in disposition, spelling, and punctuation, to the great- 
est advantage. 

For the permission under which the copyright pieces are 
inserted, thanks are due to the respective proprietors, without 
whose liberal concurrence the scheme of the collection would 
have been defeated. 

In the arrangement, the most poetically effective order has 
been attempted. The English mind has passed through phases 
of thought and cultivation so various and so opposed during 
these three centuries of Poetry, that as rapid passage between 
Old and New, like rapid alteration of the eye's focus in looking 
at the landscape, will always be wearisome and hurtful to the 
sense of beauty. The poems have been therefore distributed 
into Books Corresponding, I to the Ninety years closing about 
1616, II thence to 1700, III to 1800, IV to the half Century just 
ended. Or, looking at the Poets who more or less give each 
portion its distinctive character, they might be called the Books 
of Shakespeare, Milton, Gray, and Wordsworth. The volume, 
in this respect, so far as the limitations of its range allow, accu- 
rately reflects the natural growth and evolution of our Poetry. 
A rigidly Chronological sequence, however, rather fits a collec- 
tion aiming at instruction rather than at pleasure, and the Wis- 
dom which comes through Pleasure: — within each book the 
pieces have therefore been arranged in gradations of feeling or 
subject. The development of the symphonies of Mozart and 
Beethoven has been here thought of as a model, and nothing 
placed without careful consideration. And it is hoped that the 
contents of this Anthology will thus be found to present a certain 
unity, as episodes, in the noble language of Shelley, " to that great 
Poem which all poets, like the co-operating thoughts of one great 
mind, have built up since the beginning of the world." 

As he closes his long survey, the Editor trusts he may add 
without egotism, that he has found the vague general verdict 



32 PREFACE 

of popular Fame more just than those have thought, who, with 
too severe a criticism, would confine judgments on Poetry to 
"the selected few of many generations." Not many appear to 
have gained reputation without some gift or performance that, 
in due degree, deserved it: and if no verses by certain writers 
who show less strength than sweetness or more thought than 
mastery in expression, are printed in this volume, it should not be 
imagined that they have been excluded without much hesitation 
and regret, far less that they have been slighted. Throughout 
this vast and pathetic array of singers now silent, few have been 
honoured with the name of Poet, and have not possessed a skill 
in words, a sympathy with beauty, a tenderness of feeling, or 
seriousness in reflection, which render their works — although 
never perhaps attaining that loftier and finer excellence here 
required — better worth reading than much of what fills the 
scanty hours that most men spare for self-improvement or for 
pleasure in any of its more elevated and permanent forms. And 
if this be true of even mediocre poetry, for how much more are 
w^e indebted to the best! Like the famous fountain of the Azores, 
but with a more various power, the magic of this Art can confer 
on each period of life its appropriate blessing: on early years 
Experience, on maturity Calm, on age Youthfulness. Poetry 
gives "treasures more golden than gold," leading us in higher and 
healthier ways than those of the world, and interpreting to us 
the works of Nature. But she speaks best for herself. Her 
true accents, if the plan has been executed with success, may be 
heard throughout the following pages: — wherever the Poets 
of England are honoured, wherever the dominant language of 
the world is spoken, it is hoped that they will find fit audience. 



THE GOLDEN TEEASURY 
BOOK FIRST 

I 

SPRING 

Spring, the sweet Spring, is the year's pleasant kii;ig; 
Then blooms each thing, then maids dance in a ring, 
Cold doth not sting, the pretty birds do sing, 
Cuckoo, jug-jug, pu-we, to-witta-woo ! 

The palm and may make country houses gay, 
Lambs frisk and play, the shepherds pipe all day, 
And we hear aye birds tune this merry lay, 
Cuckoo, jug-jug, pu-we, to-witta-woo. 

The fields breathe sweet, the daisies kiss our feet, 
Young lovers meet, old wives a-sunning sit. 
In every street these tunes our ears do greet, 
Cuckoo, jug-jug, pu-we, to-witta-woo! 
Spring! the sweet Spring! 

T. Nash 



33 



34 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

II 
THE FAIRY LIFE 

1 

Where the bee sucks, there suck I: 

In a cowslip's bell I lie; 

There I couch, when owls do cry: 

On the bat's back I do fly 

After summer merrily. 

Merrily, merrily, shall I live now, 

Under the blossom that hangs on the bough! 

Ill 

2 

Come unto these yellow sands. 

And then take hands: 
Courtsied when you have, and kiss'd 

The wild waves whist, 
Foot it featly here and there; 
And, sweet Sprites, the burthen bear. 
Hark, hark! 

Bow-bow. 
The watch-dogs bark: 

Bow-wow. 
Hark, hark! I hear 
The strain of strutting chanticleer 
Cry, Cock-a-diddle-dow ! 

W. Shakespeare 



BOOK FIRST 35 

IV 

SUMMONS TO LOVE 

Phoebus, arise! 

And paint the sable skies 

With azure, white, and red: 

Rouse Memnon's mother from her Tithon's bed 

That she may thy career with roses spread: 

The nightingales thy coming each-where sing: 

Make an eternal Spring! 

Give life to this dark world which Heth dead; 

Spread forth thy golden hair 

In larger locks than thou wast wont before, 

And emperor-like decore 

With diadem of pearl thy temples fair : 

Chase hence the ugly night 

Which serves but to make dear thy glorious light. 

— This is that happy morn, 

That day, long-wished day 

Of all my life so dark, 

(If cruel stars have not my ruin sworn 

And fates my hopes betray). 

Which, purely white, deserves 

An everlasting diamond should it mark. 

This is the morn should bring unto this grove 

My Love, to hear and recompense my love. 

Fair King, who all preserves. 

But show thy blushing beams, 

And thou two sweeter eyes 

Shalt see than those which by Pen^us' streams 



36 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Did once thy heart surprize. 

Now, Flora, deck thyself in fairest guise: 

If that ye winds would hear 

A voice surpassing far Amphion's lyre, 

Your furious chiding stay; 

Let Zephyr only breathe, 

And with her tresses play. 

— The winds all silent are. 

And Phoebus in his chair 

Ensaffroning sea and air 

Makes vanish every star: 

Night like a drunkard reels 

Beyond the hills, to shun his flaming wheels: 

The fields with flowers are deck'd in every hue, 

The clouds with orient gold spangle their blue; 

Here is the pleasant place — 

And nothing wanting is, save She, alas! 

W. Drummond of Hawthornden 



V 

TIME AND LOVE 

1 
When I have seen by Time's fell hand defaced 
The rich proud cost of out-worn buried age; 
When sometime lofty towers I see down-razed, 
And brass eternal slave to mortal rage; 

When I have seen the hungry ocean gain 
Advantage on the kingdom of the shorC; 



BOOK FIRST 37 

And the firm soil win of the watery main, 
Increasing store with loss, and loss with store; 

When I have seen such interchange of state, 
Or state itself confounded to decay. 
Ruin hath taught me thus to ruminate — 
That Time will come and take my Love away: 

— This thought is as a death, which cannot choose 
But weep to have that which it fears to lose. 

W. Shakespeare 

VI 

2 

Since brass, nor stone, nor earth, nor boundless sea, 
But sad mortality o'ersways their power. 
How with this rage shall beauty hold a plea. 
Whose action is no stronger than a flower? 

O how shall summer's honey breath hold out 
Against the wreckful siege of battering days, 
When rocks impregnable are not so stout 
Nor gates of steel so strong, but time decays? 

O fearful meditation! where, alack! 
Shall Time's best jewel from Time's chest lie hid? 
Or what strong hand can hold his swift foot back, 
Or who his spoil of beauty can forbid? 

O! none, unless this miracle have might. 
That in black ink my love may still shine l)right. 

W. Shakespeare 



38 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

VII 

THE PASSIONATE SHEPHERD TO HIS 
LOVE 

Come live with me and be my Love, 
And we will all the pleasures prove 
That hills and valleys, dale and field. 
And all the craggy mountains yield. 

There will we sit upon the rocks 
And see the shepherds feed their flocks, 
By shallow rivers, to whose falls 
Melodious birds sing madrigals. 

There will I make thee beds of roses 
And a thousand fragrant posies, 
A cap of flowers, and a kirtle 
Embroider' d all with leaves of myrtle. 

A gown made of the finest wool. 
Which from our pretty lambs we pull, 
Fair lined slippers for the cold. 
With buckles of the purest gold. 

A belt of straw and ivy buds 
With coral clasps and amber studs: 
And if these pleasures may thee move, 
Come live with me and be my Love. 

Thy silver dishes for thy meat 
As precious as the gods do eat, 



BOOK FIRST 39 

Shall on an ivory table be 
Prepared each day for thee and me. 

The shepherd swains shall dance and sing 
For thy delight each May-morning: 
If these delights thy mind may move, 
Then live with me and be my Love. 

C. Marlowe 



VIII 

OMNIA VINCIT 

Fain would I change that note 
To which fond Love hath charm'd me 
Long long to sing by rote, 
Fancying that that harm'd me: 
Yet when this thought doth come 
' Love is the perfect sum 

Of all delight,' 
I have no other choice 
Either for pen or voice 

To sing or write. 

O Love! they wrong thee much 
That say thy sweet is bitter, 
When thy rich fruit is such 
As nothing can be sweeter. 
Fair house of joy and bliss, 
Where truest pleasure is, 
I do adore thee: 



40 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

I know thee what thou art, 
I serve thee with my heart, 
And fall before thee! 

Anon. 

IX 

A MADRIGAL 

Crabbed Age and Youth 

Cannot live together: 

Youth is full of pleasance. 

Age is full of care; 

Youth like summer morn, 

Age like winter weather, 

Youth like summer brave, 

Age like winter bare: 

Youth is full of sport, 

Age's breath is short. 

Youth is nimble, Age is lame: 

Youth is hot and bold, 

Age is weak and cold. 

Youth is wild, and Age is tame: — 

Age, I do abhor thee. 

Youth, I do adore thee; 

O! my Love, my Love is young! 

Age, I do defy thee — 

O sweet shepherd, hie thee. 

For methinks thou stay'st too long. 

W. Shakespeare 



BOOK FIRST 41 

X 

Under the greenwood tree 
Who loves to He with me, 
And turn his merry note 
Unto the sweet bird's throat — 
Come hither, come hither, come hither! 
Here shall he see 
No enemy 
But winter and rough weather. 

Who doth ambition shun 
And loves to live i' the sun, 
Seeking the food he eats 
And pleased with what he gets — 
Come hither, come hither, come hither! 
Here shall he see 
No enemy 
But winter and rough weather. 

W. Shakespeare 

XI 

It was a lover and his lass 

With a hey and a ho, and a hey nonino ! 
That o'er the green corn-field did pass 
In the spring time, the only pretty ring time, 
When birds do sing hey ding a ding: 

Sweet lovers love the Spring. 

Between the acres of the rye 

These pretty country folks would lie: 



42 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

This carol they began that hour, 
How that hfe was but a flower: 

And therefore take the present time 

With a hey and a ho and a hey nonino! 
For love is crowned with the prime 
In spring time, the only prett}^ ring time, 
When birds do sing hey ding a ding: 
Sweet lovers love the Spring. 

W. Shakespeare 

XII 
PRESENT IN ABSENCE 

Absence, hear thou this protestation 

Against thy strength, 

Distance, and length; 
Do what thou canst for alteration: 

For hearts of truest mettle 
Absence doth join, and Time doth settle. 

Who loves a mistress of such quality. 

His mind hath found 

Affection's ground 
Beyond time, place, and mortality. 

To hearts that cannot vary 
Absence is present. Time doth tarry. 

By absence this good means I gain, 
That I can catch her, 
Where none can match her, 



BOOK FIRST 43 

In some close corner of my brain : 

There I embrace and kiss her; 
And so I both enjoy and miss her. 

/. Donne 

XIII 

VIA AMORIS 

High-way, since you my chief Parnassus be, 
And that my Muse, to some ears not unsweet, 
Tempers her words to tramphng horses' feet 
More oft than to a chamber melody, — 

Now, blessed you bear onward blessed me 
To her, where I my heart, safe-left, shall meet; 
My Muse and I must you of duty greet 
With thanks and wishes, wishing thankfully; 

Be you still fair, honour'd by public heed; 
By no encroachment wrong'd, nor time forgot; 
Nor blamed for blood, nor shamed for sinful deed; 
And that you know I envy you no lot 

Of highest wish, I wish you so much bliss, — 
Hundreds of years you Stella's feet may kiss! 

Sir P. Sidney 

XIV 

ABSENCE 

Being your slave, what should I do but tend 
Upon the hours and times of your desire? 



44 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

I have no precious time at all to spend 
Nor services to do, till you require: 

Nor dare I chide the world-without-end-hour 
Whilst I, my sovereign, watch the clock for you, 
Nor think the bitterness of absence sour 
When you have bid your servant once adieu: 

Nor dare I question with my jealous thought 
Where you may be, or your affairs suppose, 
But like a sad slave, stay and think of nought 
Save, where you are, how happy you make those; 

So true a fool is love, that in your will 
Though you do anything, he thinks no ill. 

W. Shakespeare 

XV 

How like a winter hath my absence been 
From Thee, the pleasure of the fleeting year! 
What freezings have I felt, what dark days seen, 
What old December's bareness everywhere! 

And yet this time removed was summer's time: 
The teeming autumn, big with rich increase, 
Bearing the wanton burden of the prime 
Like widow'd wombs after their lords' decease: 

Yet this abundant issue seem'd to me 
But hope of orphans, and unfather'd fruit; 
For summer and his pleasures wait on thee, 
And, thou away, the very birds are mute; 



BOOK FIRST 45 

Or if they sing, 'tis with so dull a cheer, 
That leaves look pale, dreading the winter's near. 

W. Shakespeare 

XVI 

A CONSOLATION 

When in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes 
I all alone beweep my outcast state, 
And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries. 
And look upon myself, and curse my fate; 

Wishing me Hke to one more rich in hope. 
Featured like him, like him with friends possest, 
Desiring this man's art, and that man's scope. 
With what I most enjoy contented least; 

Yet in these thoughts myself almost despising, 
Haply I think on Thee — and then my state. 
Like to the lark at break of day arising 
From sullen earth, sings hymns at heaven's gate; 

For thy sweet love remember'd, such wealth brings 
That then I scorn to change my state with kings. 

W. Shakespeare 

XVII 

THE UNCHANGEABLE 

O NEVER say that I was false of heart, 
Though absence seem'd my flame to quahfy. 



46 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

As easy might I from myself depart 

As from my soul, which in thy breast doth lie; 

That is my home of love; if I have ranged, 
Like him that travels, I return again. 
Just to the time, not with the time exchanged, 
So that myself bring water for my stain. 

Never believe, though in my nature reign'd 
All frailties that besiege all kinds of blood. 
That it could so preposterously be stain'd 
To leave for nothing all thy sum of good : 

For nothing this wide universe I call. 
Save thou, my rose: in it thou art my all. 

W. Shakespeare 

XVIII 

To me, fair Friend, you never can be old. 
For as you were when first your eye I eyed 
Such seems your beauty still. Three winters' cold 
Have from the forests shook three summers' pride; 

Three beauteous springs to yellow autumn turn'd 
In process of the seasons have I seen. 
Three April perfumes in three hot Junes burn'd, 
Since first I saw you fresh, which yet are green. 

Ah! yet doth beauty, like a dial-hand. 

Steal from his figure, and no pace perceived; 

So your sweet hue, which methinks still doth stand, 

Hath motion, and mine eye may be deceived: 



BOOK FIRST 47 

For fear of which, hear this, thou age unbred, — 
Ere you were born, was beauty's summer dead. 

W. Shakespeare 

XIX 

ROSALINE 

Like to the clear in highest sphere 
Where all imperial glory shines, 
Of selfsame colour is her hair 
Whether unfolded, or in twines: 

Heigh ho, fair Rosaline! 
Her eyes are sapphires set in snow, 
Resembling heaven by every wink; 
The Gods do fear whenas they glow, 
And I do tremble when I think 

Heigh ho, would she were mine! 

Her cheeks are like the blushing cloud 
That beautifies Aurora's face, 
Or hke the silver crimson shroud 
That Phoebus' smiling looks doth grace; 

Heigh ho, fair Rosaline! 
Her lips are like two budded roses 
Whom ranks of lilies neighbour nigh. 
Within which bounds she balm encloses 
Apt to entice a deity: 

Heigh ho, would she were mine! 

Her neck is like a stately tower 
Where Love himself imprison'd lies, 



48 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

To watch for glances every hour 
From her divine and sacred eyes: 

Heigh ho, for RosaUne! 
Her paps are centres of dehght, 
Her breasts are orbs of heavenly frame, 
Where Nature moulds the dew of light 
To feed perfection with the same: 

Heigh ho, would she were mine! 

With orient pearl, with ruby red, 
With marble white, with sapphire blue 
Her body every way is fed. 
Yet soft in touch and sweet in view: 

Heigh ho, fair Rosaline! 
Nature herself her shape admires; 
The Gods are wounded in her sight; 
And Love forsakes his heavenly fires 
And at her eyes his brand doth light: 

Heigh ho, would she were mine! 

Then muse not, Nymphs, though I bemoan 
The absence of fair Rosaline, 
Since for a fair there's fairer none, 
Nor for her virtue so divine: 
Heigh ho, fair Rosaline; 
Heigh ho, my heart! would God that she were mine! 

r. Lodge 



BOOK FIRST 49 

XX 

COLIN 

Beauty sat bathing by a spring 

Where fairest shades did hide her; 
The winds blew calm, the birds did sing, 

The cool streams ran beside her. 
My wanton thoughts enticed mine eye 

To see what was forbidden : 
But better memory said, fie! 

So vain desire was chidden : — 
Hey nonny nonny O ! 
Hey nonny nonny! 

Into a slumber then I fell, 
When fond imagination 
Seemed to see, but could not tell 

Her feature or her fashion. 
But ev'n as babes in dreams do smile, 

And sometimes fall a-weeping, 
So I awaked, as wise this while 
As when I fell a-sleeping : — 
Hey nonny nonny ! 
Hey nonny nonny ! 

The Shepherd Tonie 

XXI 

A PICTURE 

Sweet Love, if thou wilt gain a monarch's glory, 
Subdue her heart, who makes me glad and sorry: 



50 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Out of thy golden quiver 
Take thou thy strongest arrow 
That will through bone and marrow, 
And me and thee of grief and fear deliver : — 
But come behind, for if she look upon thee, 
Alas! poor Love! then thou art woe-begone thee! 

Anon. 

XXII 

A SONG FOR MUSIC 

Weep you no more, sad fountains: — 

What need you flow so fast? 
Look how the snowy mountains 

Heaven's sun doth gently waste ! 
But my Sun's heavenly eyes 
View not your weeping, 
That now hes sleeping 
Softly, now sloftly lies. 
Sleeping. 

Sleep is a reconciling, 

A rest that peace begets : — 
Doth not the sun rise smiling, 
When fair at even he sets? 

— Rest you, then, rest, sad eyes! 
Melt not in weeping! 
While She lies sleeping 
Softly, now softly lies. 

Sleeping! ^^^^_ 



BOOK FIRST 51 

XXIII 

TO HIS LOVE 

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? 
Thou art more lovely and more temperate : 
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, 
And summer's lease hath all too short a date: 

Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, 

And often is his gold complexion dimm'd : 

And every fair from fair sometime declines. 

By chance, or nature's changing course, untrimm'd. 

But thy eternal summer shall not fade 
Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest; 
Nor shall Death brag thou wanderest in his shade, 
When in eternal lines to time thou growest : — 

So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see. 
So long lives this, and this gives hfe to thee. 

W. Shakespeare 



XXIV 

TO HIS LOVE 

When in the chronicle of wasted time 
I see descriptions of the fairest wights. 
And beauty making beautiful old rhyme 
In praise of ladies dead, and lovely knights; 



52 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Then in the blazon of sweet beauty's best 
Of hand, of foot, of Up, of eye, of brow, 
I see their antique pen would have exprest 
Ev'n such a beauty as you master now. 

So all their praises are but prophecies 

Of this our time, all, you prefiguring; 

And for they look'd but with divining eyes. 

They had not skill enough your worth to sing: 

For we, which now behold these present days. 
Have eyes to wonder, but lack tongues to praise. 

W. Shakespeare 

XXV 

BASIA 

Turn back, you wanton flyer, 
And answer my desire 

With mutual greeting. 
Yet bend a little nearer, — 
True beauty still shines clearer 

In closer meeting! 
Hearts with hearts delighted 
Should strive to be united. 
Each other's arms with arms enchaining, — 

Hearts with a thought. 
Rosy lips with a kiss still entertaining. 

What harvest half so sweet is 
As still to reap the kisses 



BOOK FIRST 53 

Grown ripe in sowing? 
And straight to be receiver 
Of that which thou art giver, 

Rich in bestowing? 
There is no strict observing 
Of times' or seasons' swerving, 
There is ever one fresh spring abiding; 
Then what we sow with our hps 
Let us reap, love's gains dividing. 

T. Campion 

XXVI ^ 

ADVICE TO A GIRL 

Never love unless you can 

Bear with all the faults of man! 

Men sometimes will jealous be 

Though but little cause they see. 

And hang the head as discontent, 

And speak what straight they will repent. 

Men, that but one Saint adore. 
Make a show of love to more; 
Beauty must be scorn'd in none. 
Though but truly served in one: 
For what is courtship but disguise? 
True hearts may have dissembling eyes. 

Men, when their affairs require, 
Must awhile themselves retire; 
Sometimes hunt, and sometimes hawk, 



54 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

And not ever sit and talk : — 

If these and such-like you can bear, 

Then Hke, and love, and never fear! 

T. Campion 

XXVII 

LOVE'S PERJURIES 

On a day, alack the day! 
Love, whose month is ever May, 
Spied a blossom passing fair 
Playing in the wanton air: 
Through the velvet leaves the wind. 
All unseen, 'gan passage find: 
That the lover, sick to death, 
Wish'd himself the heaven's breath. 
Air, quoth he, thy cheeks may blow; 
Air, would I might triumph so! 
But, alack, my hand is sworn 
Ne'er to pluck thee from thy thorn: 
Vow, alack, for youth unmeet; 
Youth so apt to pluck a sweet. 
Do not call it sin in me 
That I am forsworn for thee: 
Thou for whom Jove would swear 
Juno but an Ethiope were, 
And deny himself for Jove, 
Turning mortal for thy love. 

W. Shakespeare 



BOOK FIRST 55 

XXVIII 

A SUPPLICATION 

Forget not yet the tried intent 
Of such a truth as I have meant; 
My great travail so gladly spent, 

Forget not yet! 

Forget not yet when first began 
The weary life ye know, since whan 
The suit, the service none tell can; 

Forget not yet! 

Forget not yet the great assays, 
The cruel wrong, the scornful ways, 
The painful patience in delays. 

Forget not yet! 

Forget not! 0, forget not this, 
How long ago hath been, and is 
The mind that never meant amiss — 
Forget not yet ! 

Forget not then thine own approved 
The which so long hath thee so loved. 
Whose steadfast faith yet never moved — 
Forget not this! 

Sir T. Wyat 



56 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

XXIX 

TO AURORA 

O IF thou knew'st how thou thyself dost harm, 
And dost prejudge thy bliss, and spoil my rest; 
Then thou would'st melt the ice out of thy breast 
And thy relenting heart would kindly warm. 

O if thy pride did not our joys controul, 
What world of loving wonders should'st thou see! 
For if I saw thee once transform'd in me, 
Then in thy bosom I would pour my soul; 

Then all my thoughts should in thy visage shine, 
And if that aught mischanced thou should'st not moan 
Nor bear the burthen of thy griefs alone; 
No, I would have my share in what were thine: 

And whilst we thus should make our sorrows one, 
This happy harmony would make them none. 

W. Alexander, Earl of Sterline 

XXX 

IN LACRIMAS 

I SAW my Lady weep, 
And Sorrow proud to be advanced so 
In those fair eyes where all perfections keep. 

Her face was full of woe. 
But such a woe (believe me) as wins more hearts 
Than Mirth can do with her enticing parts. 



BOOK FIRST 57 

Sorrow was there made fair, 
And Passion, wise; Tears, a delightful thing; 
Silence, beyond all speech, a wisdom rare: 

She made her sighs to sing, 
And all things with so sweet a sadness move 
As made my heart at once both grieve and love. 

fairer than aught else 
The world can show, leave off in time to grieve! 
Enough, enough: your joyful look excels: 

Tears kill the heart, believe. 
O strive not to be excellent in woe, 
Which only breeds your beauty's overthrow. 

Anon. 

XXXI 

TRUE LOVE 

Let me not to the marriage of true minds 
Admit impediments. Love is not love 
Which alters when it alteration finds, 
Or bends with the remover to remove : — 

O no ! it is an ever-fixed mark 

That looks on tempests, and is never shaken; 

It is the star to every wandering bark. 

Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken. 

Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks 
Within his bending sickle's compass come; 
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks, 
But bears it out ev'n to the edge of doom : — 



58 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

If this be error, and upon me proved, 
I never writ, nor no man ever loved. 

W. Shakespeare 

XXXII 

A DITTY 

My true-love hath my heart, and I have his, 
By just exchange one for another given: 
I hold his dear, and mine he cannot miss, 
There never was a better bargain driven : 
My true-love hath my heart, and I have his. 

His heart in me keeps him and me in one. 
My heart in him his thoughts and senses guides : 
He loves my heart, for once it was his own, 
I cherish his because in me it bides: 

My true-love hath my heart, and I have his. 

Sir P. Sidney 

XXXIII 

LOVE'S INSIGHT 

Though others may Her brow adore 

Yet more must I, that therein see far more 

Than any other's eyes have power to see: 

She is to me 
More than to any others she can be ! 
I can discern more secret notes 
That in the margin of her cheeks Love quotes, 



BOOK FIRST 59 

Than any else besides have art to read : 

No looks proceed 
From those fair eyes but to me wonder breed. 

Anon. 

XXXIV 

LOVE'S OMNIPRESENCE 

Were I as base as is the lowly plain, 
And you, my Love, as high as heaven above, 
Yet should the thoughts of me your humble swain 
Ascend to heaven, in honour of my Love. 

Were I as high as heaven above the plain. 
And you, my Love, as humble and as low 
As are the deepest bottoms of the main, 
Whereso'er you were, with you my love should go. 

Were you the earth, dear Love, and I the skies, 

My love should shine on you hke to the sun, 

And look upon you with ten thousand eyes 

Till heaven wax'd blind, and till the world were done. 

Whereso'er I am, below, or else above you, 
Whereso'er you are, my heart shall truly love you. 

J. Sylvester 

XXXV 

CARPE DIEM 

O Mistress mine, where are you roaming? 
O stay and hear! your true-love's coming 



60 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

That can sing both high and low; 
Trip no further, pretty sweeting, 
Journeys end in lovers meeting — 

Every wise man's son doth know. 

What is love? 'tis not hereafter; 
Present mirth hath present laughter; 

What's to come is still unsure: 
In delay there lies no plenty, — 
Then come kiss me, Sweet-and-twenty, 

Youth's a stuff will not endure. 

W. Shakespeare 

XXXVI 

AN HONEST AUTOLYCUS 

Fine knacks for ladies, cheap, choice, brave, and new, 
Good penny-worths, — but money cannot move : 

I keep a fair but for the Fair to view; 
A beggar may be liberal of love. 

Though all my wares be trash, the heart is true — 

The heart is true. 

Great gifts are guiles and look for gifts again; 
My trifles come as treasures from my mind; 
It is a precious jewel to be plain; 

Sometimes in shell the orient'st pearls we find : — 
Of others take a sheaf, of me a grain ! 

Of me a grain ! 

Anon. 



BOOK FIRST 61 

XXXVII 
WINTER 

When icicles hang by the wall 

And Dick the shepherd blows his nail, 

And Tom bears logs into the hall, 
And milk comes frozen home in pail; 

When blood is nipt, and ways be foul, 

Then nightly sings the staring owl 
Tu-whit! 

To-who! A merry note! 

While greasy Joan doth keel the pot. 

When all about the wind doth blow. 
And coughing drowns the parson's saw. 

And birds sit brooding in the snow. 
And Marian's nose looks red and raw; 

When roasted crabs hiss in the bowl — 

Then nightly sings the staring owl 
Tu-whit! 

To-who ! A merry note ! 

While greasy Joan doth keel the pot. 

W. Shakespeare 

XXXVIII 

That time of year thou may'st in me behold 
When yellow leaves, or none, or few, do hang 
Upon those boughs which shake against the cold, 
Bare ruin'd choirs, where late the sweet birds sang; 



62 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

In me thou see'st the twihght of such day 
As after sunset fadeth in the west, 
Which by and by black night doth take away, 
Death's second self, that seals up all in rest: 

In me thou see'st the glowing of such fire. 
That on the ashes of his youth doth lie 
As the death-bed whereon it must expire, 
Consumed with that which it was nourish'd by: 

— This thou perceiv'st, which makes thy love more 

strong. 
To love that well which thou must leave ere long. 

W. Shakespeare 

XXXIX 

MEMORY 

When to the sessions of sw(iet silent thought 

I summon up remembrance of things past, 

I sigh the lack of many a thing I sought. 

And with old woes new wail my dear time's waste; 

Then can I drown an eye, unused to flow, 
For precious friends hid in death's dateless night, 
And weep afresh love's long-since-cancell'd woe, 
And moan the expense of many a vanish'd sight. 

Then can I grieve at grievances foregone. 
And heavily from woe to woe tell o'er 
The sad account of fore-bemoaned moan. 
Which I new pay as if not paid before: 



BOOK FIRST 63 

— But if the while I think on thee, dear Friend, 
All losses are restored, and sorrows end. 

W. Shakespeare 

XL 

SLEEP 

Cqme, Sleep: O Sleep! the certain knot of peace, 
The baiting-place of wit, the balm of woe. 
The poor man's wealth, the prisoner's release, 
Th' indifferent judge between the high and low; 

With shield of proof shield me from out the prease 
Of those fierce darts Despair at me doth throw: 

make in me those civil wars to cease; 

1 will good tribute pay, if thou do so. 

Take thou of me smooth pillows, sweetest bed, 
A chamber deaf of noise and blind of light, 
A rosy garland and a weary head: 
And if these things, as being thine in right, 

Move not thy heavy grace, thou shalt in me, 
Livelier than elsewhere, Stella's image see. 

Sir P. Sidney 

XLI 

REVOLUTIONS 

Like as the waves make towards the pebbled shore 
So do our minutes hasten to their end; 



64 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Each changing place with that which goes before; 
In sequent toil all forwards do contend. 

Nativity, once in the main of light, 

Crawls to maturity, wherewith being crown'd, 

Crooked eclipses 'gainst his glory fight, 

And Time that gave, doth now his gift confound. 

i 
Time doth transfix the flourish set on youth, 
And delves the parallels in beauty's brow; 
Feeds on the rarities of nature's truth. 
And nothing stands but for his scythe to mow : — 

And yet, to times in hope, my verse shall stand 
Praising Thy worth, despite his cruel hand. 

W. Shakespeare 

XLII 

Faeewell! thou art too dear for my possessing, 
And like enough thou know'st thy estimate: 
The charter of thy worth gives thee releasing; 
My bonds in thee are all determinate. 

For how do I hold thee but by thy granting? 
And for that riches where is my deserving? 
The cause of this fair gift in me is wanting, 
And so my patent back again is swerving. 

Thyself thou gav'st, thy own worth then not knowing. 
Or me, to whom thou gav'st it, else mistaking; 
So thy great gift, upon misprision growing, 
Comes home again, on better judgment making. 



BOOK FIRST 65 

Thus have I had thee as a dream doth flatter; 
In sleep, a king; but waking, no such matter. 

W. Shakespeare 

XLIII 

THE LIFE WITHOUT PASSION 

They that have power to hurt, and will do none, 
'jf hat do not do the thing they most do show. 
Who, moving others, are themselves as stone, 
Unmoved, cold, and to temptation slow, — 

They rightly do inherit heaven's graces, 
And husband nature's riches from expense; 
They are the lords and owners of their faces, 
Others, but stewards of their excellence. 

The summer's flower is to the summer sweet. 
Though to itself it only live and die; 
But if that flower with base infection meet, 
The basest weed outbraves his dignity: 

For sweetest things turn sourest by their deeds; 
Lilies that fester smell far worse than weeds. 

W. Shakespeare 

XLIV 

THE LOVER'S APPEAL 

And wilt thou leave me thus? 
Say nay! say nay! for shame. 
To save thee from the blame 



66 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Of all my grief and grame. 
And wilt thou leave me thus? 
Say nay! say nay! 

And wilt thou leave me thus, 
That hath loved thee so long 
In wealth and woe among: 
And is thy heart so strong 
As for to leave me thus? 
Say nay ! say nay ! 

And wilt thou leave me thus, 
That hath given thee my heart 
Never for to depart 
Neither for pain nor smart: 
And wilt thou leave me thus? 
Say nay! say nay! 

And wilt thou leave me thus. 
And have no more pity 
Of him that loveth thee? 
Alas! thy cruelty! 
And wilt thou leave me thus? 
Say nay! say nay! 

Sir T. Wyat 

XLV 

THE NIGHTINGALE 

As it fell upon a day 

In the merry month of May, 

Sitting in a pleasant shade 



BOOK FIRST 67 

Which a grove of myrtles made, 

Beasts did leap and birds did sing, 

Trees did grow and plants did spring; 

Every thing did banish moan 

Save the Nightingale alone. 

She, poor bird, as all forlorn, 

Lean'd her breast up-till a thorn, 

And there sung the dolefull'st ditty 

That to hear it was great pity. 

Fie, fie, fie, now would she cry; 

Teru, teru, by and by: 

That to hear her so complain 

Scarce I could from tears refrain; 

For her griefs so lively shown 

Made me think upon mine own. 

— Ah, thought I, thou mourn'st in vain. 

None takes pity on thy pain : 

Senseless trees, they cannot hear thee. 

Ruthless beasts, they will not cheer thee: 

King Pandion, he is dead, 

All thy friends are lapp'd in lead : 

All thy fellow birds do sing 

Careless of thy sorrowing: 

Even so, poor bird, like thee 

None alive will pity me. 



R. Barnefield 



XLVI 



Care-charmer Sleep, son of the sable Night, 
Brother to Death, in silent darkness born. 



68 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Relieve my languish, and restore the light; 
With dark forgetting of my care return. 

And let the day be time enough to mourn 
The shipwreck of my ill-adventured youth: 
Let waking eyes suffice to wail their scorn, 
Without the torment of the night's untruth. 

Cease, dreams, the images of day-desires, 
To model forth the passions of the morrow; 
Never let rising Sun approve you liars, 
To add more grief to aggravate my sorrow: 

Still let me sleep, embracing clouds in vain, 
And never wake to feel the day's disdain. 

S. Daniel 

XLVII 

The nightingale, as soon as April bringeth 
Unto her rested sense a perfect waking. 
While late-bare earth, proud of new clothing, springeth, 
Sings out her woes, a thorn her song-book making; 
And mournfully bewailing, 
Her throat in tunes expresseth 
What grief her breast oppresseth 
For Tereus' force on her chaste will prevailing. 

O Philomela fair, O take some gladness. 
That here is juster cause of plaintful sadness: 
Thine earth now springs, mine fadeth; 
Thy thorn without, my thorn my heart invadeth. 



BOOK FIRST 69 

Alas, she hath no other cause of anguish 

But Tereus' love, on her by strong hand wroken, 
Wherein she suffering, all her spirits languish, 
Full womanlike complains her will was broken. 
But I, who, daily craving. 
Cannot have to content me, 
Have more cause to lament me, 
Since wanting is more woe than too much having. 

Philomela fair, take some gladness 
That here is juster cause of plaintful sadness: 
Thine earth now springs, mine fadeth; 
Thy thorn without, my thorn my heart invadeth. 

Sir P. Sidney 



XLVIII 

FRUSTRA 

Take, take those lips away 
That so sweetly were forsworn. 
And those eyes, the break of day. 
Lights that do mislead the morn: 
But my kisses bring again. 

Bring again — 
Seals of love, but seal'd in vain, 

Seal'd in vain! 

W. Shakespeare 



70 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

XLIX 

LOVE'S FAREWELL 

Singe there's no help, come let us kiss and part, — 
Nay I have done, you get no more of me; 
And I am glad, yea, glad with all my heart, 
That thus so cleanly I myself can free; 

Shake hands for ever, cancel all our vows. 
And when we meet at any time again, 
Be it not seen in either of our brows 
That we one jot of former love retain. 

Now at the last gasp of love's latest breath. 
When his pulse faihng, passion speechless lies, 
When faith is kneeling by his bed of death. 
And irmocence is closing up his eyes, 

— Now if thou would'st, when all have given him over. 
From death to life thou might'st him yet recover! 

M. Drayton 



L 

IN IMAGINE PERTRANSIT HOMO 

Follow thy fair sun, unhappy shadow! 

Though thou be black as night 

And she made all of hght, 
Yet follow thy fair sun, unhappy shadow! 



BOOK FIRST 71 

Follow her, whose light thy hght depriveth! 

Though here thou liv'st disgraced, 

And she in heaven is placed, 
Yet follow her whose light the world reviveth! 

Follow those pure beams, whose beauty burneth, 

That so have scorched thee 

As thou still black must be 
Till her kind beams thy black to brightness turneth. 

Follow her, while yet her glory shineth ! 

There comes a luckless night 

That will dim all her Hght; 
— And this the black unhappy shade divineth. 

Follow still, since so thy fates ordained! 

The sun must have his shade. 

Till both at once do fade, — 
The sun still proved, the shadow still disdained. 

T. Campion 

LI 

BLIND LOVE 

O ME ! what eyes hath Love put in my head 
Which have no correspondence with true sight: 
Or if they have, where is my judgment fled 
That censures falsely what they see aright? 

If that be fair whereon my false eyes dote. 
What means the world to say it is not so? 



72 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

If it be not, then love doth well denote 
Love's eye is not so true as all men's: No, 

How can it? O how can love's eye be true, 
That is so vex'd with watching and with tears? 
No marvel then though I mistake my view: 
The sun itself sees not till heaven clears. 

O cunning Love! with tears thou keep'st me bUnd, 
Lest eyes well-seeing thy foul faults should find ! 

W. Shakespeare 

LII 

Sleep, angry beauty, sleep and fear not me! 

For who a sleeping lion dares provoke? 
It shall suffice me here to sit and see 

Those lips shut up that never kindly spoke: 
What sight can more content a lover's mind 
Than beauty seeming harmless, if not kind? 

My words have charm'd her, for secure she sleeps. 
Though guilty much of wrong done to my love; 

And in her slumber, see! she close-eyed weeps: 
Dreams often more than waking passions move. 

Plead, Sleep, my cause, and make her soft like thee: 

That she in peace may wake and pity me. 

T. Campion 



BOOK FIRST 73 

LIII 

THE UNFAITHFUL SHEPHERDESS 

While that the sun with his beams hot 
Scorched the fruits in vale and mountain, 
Philon the shepherd, late forgot, 
Sitting beside a crystal fountain. 

In shadow of a green oak tree 

Upon his pipe this song play'd he: 
Adieu, Love, adieu, Love, untrue Love, 
Untrue Love, untrue Love, adieu. Love; 
Your mind is light, soon lost for new love. 

So long as I was in your sight 
I was your heart, your soul, and treasure; 
And evermore you sobb'd and sigh'd 
Burning in flames beyond all measure : 

— Three days endured your love to me, 

And it was lost in other three ! 
Adieu Love, adieu. Love, untrue Love, 
Untrue Love, untrue Love, adieu, Love; 
Your mind is light, soon lost for new love. 

Another Shepherd you did see 
To whom your heart was soon enchained; 
Full soon your love was leapt from me, 
Full soon my place he had obtained. 

Soon came a third, your love to win, 

And we were out and he was in. 
Adieu, Love, adieu. Love, untrue Love, 



74 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Untrue Love, untrue Love, adieu, Love; 
Your mind is light, soon lost for new love. 

Sure you have made me passing glad 
That you your mind so soon removed, 
Before that I the leisure had 
To choose you for my best beloved: 
For all your love was past and done 
Two days before it was begun : — 
Adieu, Love, adieu. Love, untrue Love, 
Untrue Love, untrue Love, adieu. Love; 
Your mind is light, soon lost for new love. 

Anon» 



LIV 

ADVICE TO A LOVER 

The sea hath many thousand sands, 
The sun hath motes as many; 
The sky is full of stars, and Love 
As full of woes as any: 
Believe me, that do know the elf, 
And make no trial by thyself! 

It is in truth a pretty toy 

For babes to play withal : — 

But O! the honeys of our youth 

Are oft our age's gall! 

Self-proof in time will make thee know 

He was a prophet told thee so; 



BOOK FIRST 75 

A prophet that, Cassandra-Uke, 
Tells truth without belief; 
For headstrong Youth will run his race, 
Although his goal be grief : — 
Love's Martyr, when his heat is past, 
Proves Care's Confessor at the last. 

Anon, 

LV 
A RENUNCIATION 

Thou art not fair, for all thy red and white, 
For all those rosy ornaments in thee, — 

Thou art not sweet, though made of mere delight, 
Nor fair, nor sweet — unless thou pity me ! 

I will not soothe thy fancies; thou shalt prove 

That beauty is no beauty without love. 

— Yet love not me, nor seek not to allure 

My thoughts with beauty, were it more divine: 
Thy smiles and kisses I cannot endure, 

I'll not be wrapp'd up in those arms of thine: 

— Now show it, if thou be a woman right — 
Embrace and kiss and love me in despite! 

T. Campion 

LVI 

Blow, blow, thou winter wind. 
Thou art not so unkind 
As man's ingratitude; 
Thy tooth is not so keen 



76 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Because thou art not seen, 

Although thy breath be rude. 
Heigh ho! sing heigh ho! unto the green holly: 
Most friendship is feigning, most loving mere folly: 

Then, heigh ho! the holly! 

This life is most jolly. 

Freeze, freeze, thou bitter sky, 

Thou dost not bite so nigh 

As benefits forgot : 

Though thou the waters warp, 

Thy sting is not so sharp 

As friend remember 'd not. 
Heigh ho! sing heigh ho! unto the green holly: 
Most friendship is feigning, most loving mere folly: 

Then, heigh ho! the holly! 

This hfe is most jolly. 

W. Shakespeare 

LVII 
A SWEET LULLABY 

Come little babe, come silly soul, 

Thy father's shame, thy mother's grief, 

Born as I doubt to all our dole. 

And to thy self unhappy chief: 

Sing Lullaby and lap it warm. 

Poor soul that thinks no creature harm. 

Thou little think'st and less dost know, 
The cause of this thy mother's moan, 



BOOK FIRST 77 

Thou want'st the wit to wail her woe, 
And I myself am all alone: 

Why dost thou weep? why dost thou wail? 

And knowest not yet what thou dost ail. 

Come little wretch, ah silly heart. 

Mine only joy, what can I more? 

If there be any wrong thy smart 

That may the destinies implore: 

'Twas I, I say, against my will, 
I wail the time, but be thou still. 

And dost thou smile, oh thy sweet face! 
Would God Himself He might thee see. 
No doubt thou would'st soon purchase grace, 
I know right well, for thee and me: 

But come to mother, babe, and play, 

For father false is fled away. 

Sweet boy, if it by fortune chance, 

Thy father home again to send. 

If death do strike me with his lance. 

Yet mayst thou me to him commend : 
If any ask thy mother's name. 
Tell how by love she purchased blame. 

Then will his gentle heart soon yield, 

I know him of a noble mind. 

Although a Lion in the field, 

A lamb in town thou shalt him find: 

Ask blessing, babe, be not afraid. 
His sugar'd words hath me betray'd. 



78 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Then mayst thou joy and be right glad, 
Although in woe I seem to moan, 
Thy father is no rascal lad, 
A noble youth of blood and bone : 

His glancing looks, if he once smile, 
Right honest women may beguile. 

Come, little boy, and rock asleep. 

Sing lullaby and be thou still; 

I that can do nought else but weep, 

Will sit by thee and wail my fill : 

God bless my babe, and lullaby 
From this thy father's quaUty! 

Anon. 



LVIII 

With how sad steps, O Moon, thou climb'st the skies! 
How silently, and with how wan a face! 
What, may it be that e'en in heavenly place 
That busy archer his sharp arrows tries! 

Sure, if that long-with-love-acquainted eyes 
Can judge of love, thou feel'st a lover's case, 
I read it in thy looks; thy languish'd grace. 
To me, that feel the like, thy state descries. 

Then, e'en of fellowship, O Moon, tell me. 
Is constant love deem'd there but want of wit? 
Are beauties there as proud as here they be? 
Do they above love to be loved, and yet 



BOOK FIRST 79 

Those lovers scorn whom that love doth possess? 
Do they call virtue, there, ungratefulness? 

Sir P, Sidney 

LIX 

O CRUDELIS AMOR 

When thou must home to shades of underground, 

And there arrived, a new admired guest. 

The beauteous spirits do engirt thee round, 

White lope, blithe Helen, and the rest, 

To hear the stories of thy finish'd love 

From that smooth tongue whose music hell can move; 

Then wilt thou speak of banqueting delights. 
Of masques and revels which sweet youth did make, 
Of tourneys and great challenges of Knights, 
And all these triumphs for thy beauty's sake : 
When thou hast told these honours done to thee, 
Then tell, tell, how thou didst murder me! 

T. Campion 

LX 

SEPHESTIA'S SONG TO HER CHILD 

Weep not, my wanton, smile upon my knee*; 
When thou art old there's grief enough for thee. 

Mother's wag, pretty boy. 

Father's sorrow, father's joy; 

When thy father first did see 

Such a boy by him and me, 



80 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

He was glad, I was woe, 
Fortune changed made him so. 
When he left his pretty boy 
Last his sorrow, first his joy. 



Weep not, my wanton, smile upon my knee. 
When thou art old there's grief enough for thee. 

Streaming tears that never stint. 

Like pearl drops from a flint, 

Fell by course from his eyes. 

That one another's place supplies; 

Thus he grieved in every part, 

Tears of blood fell from his heart, 

When he left his pretty boy, 

Father's sorrow, father's joy. 

Weep not, my wanton, smile upon my knee, 
When thou art old, there's grief enough for thee. 

The wanton smiled, father wept. 

Mother cried, baby leapt; 

More he crow'd, more we cried. 

Nature could not sorrow hide: 

He must go, he must kiss 

Child and mother, baby bless, 

For he left his pretty boy. 

Father's sorrow, father's joy. 
Weep not, my wanton, smile upon my knee, 
When thou art old, there's grief enough for thee. 

R. Greene 



BOOK FIRST 81 

LXI 

A LAMENT 

My thoughts hold mortal strife; 

I do detest my life, 

And with lamenting cries 

Peace to my soul to bring 

Oft call that prince which here doth monarchize : 

— But he, grim grinning King, 

Who caitiffs scorns, and doth the blest surprize, 

Late having deck'd with beauty's rose his tomb. 

Disdains to crop a weed, and will not come. 

W. Drummond 

LXII 

DIRGE OF LOVE 

Come away, come away, Death, 
And in sad cypres let me be laid; 

Fly away, fly away, breath; 
I am slain by a fair cruel maid. 
My shroud of white, stuck all with yew, 

O prepare it! 
My part of death, no one so true 
Did share it. 

Not a flower, not a flower sweet 
On my black coffin let there be strown; 

Not a friend, not a friend greet 
My poor corpse, where my bones shall be thrown : 



82 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

A thousand thousand sighs to save, 

Lay me, O where 
Sad true lover never find my grave, 

To weep there. 

W. Shakespeare 



LXIII 

TO HIS LUTE 

My lute, be as thou wert when thou didst grow 
With thy green mother in some shady grove. 
When immelodious winds but made thee move. 
And birds their ramage did on thee bestow. 

Since that dear Voice which did thy sounds approve. 
Which wont in such harmonious strains to flow. 
Is reft from Earth to tune those spheres above, 
What art thou but a harbinger of woe? 

Thy pleasing notes be pleasing notes no more, 
But orphans' wailings to the fainting ear; 
Each stroke a sigh, each sound draws forth a tear; 
For which be silent as in woods before : 

Or if that any hand to touch thee deign. 
Like widow'd turtle, still her loss complain. 

W. Drummond 



BOOK FIRST 83 

LXIV 
FIDELE 

Fear no more the heat o' the sun 

Nor the furious winter's rages; 
Thou thy worldly task hast done, 

Home art gone and ta'en thy wages: 
Golden lads and girls all must, 
As chimney-sweepers, come to dust. 

Fear no more the frown o' the great, 
Thou art past the tyrant's stroke; 

Care no more to clothe and eat; 
To thee the reed is as the oak: 

The sceptre, learning, physic, must 

All follow this, and come to dust. 

Fear no more the lightning-flash 

Nor the all-dreaded thunder-stone; 

Fear not slander, censure rash; 

Thou hast finish 'd joy and moan: 

All lovers young, all lovers must 

Consign to thee, and come to dust. 

W. Shakespeare 



LXV 

A SEA DIRGE 

Full fathom five thy father lies: 
Of his bones are coral made; 



84 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Those are pearls that were his eyes: 
Nothing of him that doth fade, 
But doth suffer a sea-change 
Into something rich and strange. 
Sea-nymphs hourly ring his knell : 
Hark! now I hear them, — 
Ding, dong, bell. 

W. Shakespeare 

LXVI 

A LAND DIRGE 

Call for the robin-redbreast and the wren, 

Since o'er shady groves they hover 

And with leaves and flowers do cover 

The friendless bodies ot unburied men. 

Call unto his funeral dole 

The ant, the field-mouse, and the mole 

To rear him hillocks that shall keep him warm 

And (when gay tombs are robb'd) sustain no harm; 

But keep the wolf far thence, that's foe to men. 

For with his nails he'll dig them up again. 

J. Webster 

LXVII 

POST MORTEM 

If Thou survive my well-contented day 

When that churl Death my bones with dust shall cover, 

And shalt by fortune once more re-survey 

These poor rude lines of thy deceased lover; 



BOOK FIRST 85 

Compare them with the bettering of the time, 
And though they be outstripp'd by every pen, 
Reserve them for my love, not for their rhyme 
Exceeded by the height of happier men. 

O then vouchsafe me but this loving thought — 
' Had my friend's Muse grown with this growing age, 
A dearer birth than this his love had brought, 
To march in ranks of better equipage : 

But since he died, and poets better prove. 
Theirs for their style I'll read, his for his love.' 

W. Shakespeare 

LXVIII 

THE TRIUMPH OF DEATH 

No longer mourn for me when I am dead 
Than you shall hear the surly sullen bell 
Give warning to the world, that I am fled 
From this vile world, with vilest worms to dwell; 

Nay, if you read this hne, remember not 
The hand that writ it; for I love you so. 
That I in your sweet thoughts would be forgot 
If thinking on me then should make you woe. 

if, I say, you look upon this verse 
When I perhaps compounded am with clay, 
Do not so much as my poor name rehearse. 
But let your love even with my life decay; 



86 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Lest the wise world should look into your moan, 
And mock you with me after I am gone. 

W. Shakespeare 

LXIX 

YOUNG LOVE 

Tell me where is Fancy bred, 
Or in the heart, or in the head? 
How begot, how nourished? 
Reply, reply. 

It is engender' d in the eyes; 
With gazing fed; and Fancy dies 
In the cradle where it lies: 
Let us all ring Fancy's knell; 
I'll begin it, — Ding, dong, bell. 
— Ding, dong, bell. 

W. Shakespeare 

LXX 

A DILEMMA 

Lady, when I behold the roses sprouting 
Which clad in damask mantles deck the arbours. 
And then behold your lips where sweet love 
harbours. 
My eyes present me with a double doubting: 
For viewing both alike, hardly my mind supposes 
Whether the roses be your lips, or your lips the roses. 

Anon, 



BOOK FIRST 87 

LXXI 

ROSALYND'S MADRIGAL 

Love in my bosom, like a bee, 

Doth suck his sweet; 
Now with his wings he plays with me. 
Now with his feet. 
Within mine eyes he makes his nest. 
His bed amidst my tender breast; 
My kisses are his daily feast, 
And yet he robs me of my rest: 
Ah! wanton, will ye? 

And if I sleep, then percheth he 

With pretty flight, 
And makes his pillow of my knee 
The livelong night. 
Strike I my lute, he tunes the string; 
He music plays if so I sing; 
He lends me every lovely thing, 
Yet cruel he my heart doth sting: 
Whist, wanton, will ye? 

Else I with roses every day 

Will whip you hence. 
And bind you, when you long to play, 
For your offence; 
I'll shut my eyes to keep you in; 
I'll make you fast it for your sin; 
I'll count your power not worth a pin; 



88 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

— Alas! what hereby shall I win, 
If he gainsay me? 

What if I beat the wanton boy 

With many a rod? 
He will repay me with annoy, 
Because a god. 
Then sit thou safely on my knee, 
And let thy bower my bosom be; 
Lurk in mine eyes, I like of thee, 
Cupid! so thou pity me. 

Spare not, but play thee! 

T. Lodge 

LXXII 

CUPID AND CAMPASPE 

Cupid and my Campaspe play'd 

At cards for kisses; Cupid paid: 

He stakes his quiver, bow, and arrows. 

His mother's doves, and team of sparrows; 

Loses them too; then down he throws 

The coral of his lip, the rose 

Growing on's cheek (but none knows how) ; 

With these, the crystal of his brow, 

And then the dimple on his chin; 

All these did my Campaspe win: 

And last he set her both his eyes — 

She won, and Cupid blind did rise. 

O Love! has she done this to thee? 

What shall, alas! become of me? 

J. Lylye 



BOOK FIRST 89 



LXXIII 



Pack, clouds, away, and welcome day, 

With night we banish sorrow; 
Sweet air blow soft, mount larks aloft 

To give my Love good-morrow! 
Wings from the wind to please her mind 

Notes from the lark I'll borrow; 
Bird, prune thy wing, nightingale sing, 

To give my Love good-morrow; 
To give my Love good-morrow 
Notes from them both I'll borrow. 

Wake from thy nest, Robin-red-breast, 

Sing, birds, in every furrow; 
And from each hill, let music shrill 
Give my fair Love good-morrow! 
Blackbird and thrush in every bush, 

Stare, linnet, and cock-sparrow! 
You pretty elves, amongst yourselves 
Sing my fair Love good-morrow; 
To give my Love good morrow 
Sing, birds, in every furrow ! 

T. Heywood 

LXXIV 

PROTHALAMION 

Calm was the day, and through the trembling air 
Sweet-breathing Zephyrus did softly play — 
A gentle spirit, that lightly did delay 



90 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Hot Titan's beams, which then did glister fair; 

When I, (whom sullen care, 

Through discontent of my long fruitless stay 

In princes' court, and expectation vain 

Of idle hopes, which still do fly away 

Like empty shadows, did afflict my brain) 

Walk'd forth to ease my pain 

Along the shore of silver-streaming Thames; 

Whose rutty bank, the which his river hems, 

Was painted all with variable flowers, 

And all the meads adorn'd with dainty gems 

Fit to deck maidens' bowers, 

And crown their paramours 

Against the bridal day, which is not long: 

Sweet Thames! run softly, till I end my song. 

There in a meadow by the river's side 

A flock of nymphs I chanced to espy, 

All lovely daughters of the flood thereby, 

With goodly greenish locks all loose untied 

As each had been a bride; 

And each one had a little wicker basket 

Made of fine twigs, entrailed curiously. 

In which they gather'd flowers to fill their flasket. 

And with fine fingers cropt full feateously 

The tender stalks on high. 

Of every sort which in that meadow grew 

They gather'd some; the violet, pallid blue, 

The little daisy that at evening closes. 

The virgin lily and the primrose true, 

With store of vermeil roses, 



BOOK FIRST 91 

To deck their bridegrooms' posies 
Against the bridal day, which was not long: 
Sweet Thames ! run softly, till I end my song. 

With that I saw two Swans of goodly hue 
Come softly swimming down along the Lee; 
Two fairer birds I yet did never see; 
The snow which doth the top of Pindus strow 
Did never whiter show, 
Nor Jove himself, when he a swan would be 
For love of Leda, whiter did appear; 
Yet Leda was (they say) as white as he, 
Yet not so white as these, nor nothing near; 
So purely white they were 

That even the gentle stream, the which them bare, 
Seem'd foul to them, and bade his billows spare 
To wet their silken feathers, lest they might 
Soil their fair plumes with water not so fair, 
And mar their beauties bright 
That shone as Heaven's light 
Against their bridal day, which was not long: 
Sweet Thames! run softly, till I end my song. 

Eftsoons the nymphs, which now had flowers their 

fill, 
Ran in all haste to see that silver brood 
As they came floating on the crystal flood; 
Whom when they saw, they stood amazed still 
Their wondering eyes to fill; 
Them seem'd they never saw a sight so fair 



92 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Of fowls, so lovely, that they sure did deem 
Them heavenly born, or to be that same pair 
Which through the sky draw Venus' silver team; 
For sure they did not seem 
To be begot of any earthly seed, 
But rather Angels, or of Angels' breed; 
Yet were they bred of summer's heat, they say, 
In sweetest season, when each flower and weed 
The earth did fresh array; 
So fresh they seem'd as day, 
Ev'n as their bridal day, which was not long: 
Sweet Thames! run softly, till I end my song. 

Then forth they all out of their baskets drew 
Great store of flowers, the honour of the field. 
That to the sense did fragrant odours yield. 
All which upon those goodly birds they threw 
And all the waves did strew. 
That like old Peneus' waters they did seem 
When down along by pleasant Tempe's shore 
Scatter'd with flowers, through Thessaly they stream. 
That they appear, through lilies' plenteous store. 
Like a bride's chamber-floor. 

Two of those nymphs meanwhile two garlands bound 
Of freshest flowers which in that mead they found. 
The which presenting all in trim array. 
Their snowy foreheads therewithal they crown'd; 
Whilst one did sing this lay 
Prepared against that day. 
Against their bridal day, which was not long: 
Sweet Thames! run softly, till I end my song. 



BOOK FIRST 93 

*Ye gentle birds! the world's fair ornament, 
And Heaven's glory, whom this happy hour 
Doth lead unto your lovers' blissful bower, 
Joy may you have, and gentle heart's content 
Of your love's couplement; 
And let fair Venus, that is queen of love. 
With her heart-quelhng son upon you smile, 
Whose smile, they say, hath virtue to remove 
All love's dislike, and friendship's faulty guile 
For ever to assoil. 

Let endless peace your steadfast hearts accord, 
And blessed plenty wait upon your board; 
And let your bed with pleasures chaste abound, 
That fruitful issue may to you afford 
Which may your foes confound, 
And make your joys redound 
Upon your bridal day, which is not long : 
Sweet Thames! run softly, till I end my song.' 

So ended she; and all the rest around 

To her redoubled that her undersong, 

Which said their bridal day should not be long: 

And gentle Echo from the neighbour ground 

Their accents did resound. 

So forth those joyous birds did pass along 

Adown the Lee that to them murmur'd low. 

As he would speak but that he lack'd a tongue; 

Yet did by signs his glad affection show. 

Making his stream run slow. 

And all the fowl which in his flood did dwell 

'Gan flock about these twain, that did excel 



94 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

The rest, so far as Cynthia doth shend 
The lesser stars. So they, enranged well, 
Did on those two attend. 
And their best service lend 
Against their wedding day, which was not long: 
Sweet Thames! run softly, till I end my song. 

At length they all to merry London came, 

To merry London, my most kindly nurse. 

That to me gave this Hfe's first native source, 

Though from another place I take my name. 

An house of ancient fame: 

There when they came whereas those bricky towers 

The which on Thames' broad aged back do ride. 

Where now the studious lawyers have their bowers. 

There whilome wont the Templar-knights to bide, 

Till they decay 'd through pride; 

Next whereunto there stands a stately place. 

Where oft I gained gifts and goodly grace 

Of that great lord, which therein wont to dwell, 

Whose want too well now feels my friendless case; 

But ah ! here fits not well 

Old woes, but joys to tell 

Against the bridal day, which is not long: 

Sweet Thames! run softly, till I end my song. 

Yet therein now doth lodge a noble peer. 

Great England's glory and the world's wide wonder, 

Whose dreadful name late through all Spain did 

thunder. 
And Hercules' two pillars standing near 



BOOK FIRST 95 

Did make to quake and fear: 
Fair branch of honour, flower of chivalry! 
That fillest England with thy triumphs' fame 
Joy have thou of thy noble victory, 
And endless happiness of thine own name 
That promiseth the same; 
That through thy prowess and victorious arms 
Thy country may be freed from foreign harms, 
And great Elisa's glorious name may ring 
Through all the world, fill'd with thy wide alarms, 
Which some brave Muse may sing 
To ages following: 

Upon the bridal day, which is not long: 
Sweet Thames! run softly, till I end my song. 

From those high towers this noble lord issuing 

Like radiant Hesper, when his golden hair 

In th' ocean billows he hath bathed fair. 

Descended to the river's open viewing 

With a great train ensuing. 

Above the rest were goodly to be seen 

Two gentle knights of lovely face and feature, 

Beseeming well the bower of any queen. 

With gifts of wit and ornaments of nature, 

Fit for so goodly stature. 

That like the twins of Jove they seem'd in sight 

Which deck the baldric of the Heavens bright; 

They two, forth pacing to the river's side, 

Received those two fair brides, their love's delight; 

Which, at th' appointed tide. 

Each one did make his bride 



96 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Against their bridal day, which is not long: 
Sweet Thames! run softly, till I end my song. 

E. Spenser 

LXXV 

THE HAPPY HEART 

Art thou poor, yet hast thou golden slumbers? 

O sweet content! 
Art thou rich, yet is thy mind perplex'd? 

O punishment! 
Dost thou laugh to see how fools are vex'd 
To add to golden numbers, golden numbers? 
O sweet content! O sweet, O sweet content! 

Work apace, apace, apace, apace; 

Honest labour bears a lovely face; 
Then hey nonny nonny, hey nonny nonny! 

Canst drink the waters of the crisped spring? 

O sweet content! 
Swimm'st thou in wealth, yet sink'st in thine own 
tears? 

O punishment! 
Then he that patiently want's burden bears 
No burden bears, but is a king, a king! 
sweet content! O sweet, O sweet content! 
Work apace, apace, apace, apace; 
Honest labour bears a lovely face; 
Then hey nonny nonny, hey nonny nonny! 

T. Dekker 



BOOK FIRST 97 

LXXVI 
SIC TRANSIT 

Come, cheerful day, part of my life to me; 

For while thou view'st me with thy fading light 
Part of my life doth still depart with thee, 

And I still onward haste to my last night: 
Time's fatal wings do ever forward fly — 
So every day we hve, a day we die. 

But O ye nights, ordain'd for barren rest, 
How are my days deprived of life in you 

When heavy sleep my soul hath dispossest, 
By feigned death life sweetly to renew! 

Part of my life, in that, you life deny: 

So every day we live, a day we die. 

T. Campion 



LXXVII 

This Life, which seems so fair, 

Is like a bubble blown up in the air 

By sporting children's breath. 

Who chase it everywhere 

And strive who can most motion it bequeath. 

And though it sometimes seem of its own might 

Like to an eye of gold to be fix'd there. 

And firm to hover in that empty height. 

That only is because it is so light. 

— But in that pomp it doth not long appear; 



98 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

For when 'tis most admired, in a thought, 
Because it erst was nought, it turns to nought. 

W. Drummond 

LXXVIII 

SOUL AND BODY 

Poor Soul, the centre of my sinful earth, 
[Foil'd by] those rebel powers that thee array. 
Why doth thou pine within, and suffer dearth, 
Painting thy outward walls so costly gay? 

Why so large cost, having so short a lease, 
Dost thou upon thy fading mansion spend? 
Shall worms, inheritors of this excess, 
Eat up thy charge? is this thy body's end? 

Then, Soul, Hve thou upon thy servant's loss, 
And let that pine to aggravate thy store; 
Buy terms divine in selling hours of dross; 
Within be fed, without be rich no more : — 

So shalt thou feed on death, that feeds on men, 
And death once dead, there's no more dying then. 

W. Shakespeare 

LXXIX 

The man of life upright, 
Whose guiltless heart is free 

From all dishonest deeds. 
Or thought of vanity; 



BOOK FIRST 99 

The man whose silent days 

In harmless joys are spent, 
Whom hopes cannot delude 

Nor sorrow discontent: 

That man needs neither towers 

Nor armour for defence, 
Nor secret vaults to fly 

From thunder's violence. 

He only can behold 

With unaffrighted eyes 
The horrors of the deep 

And terrors of the skies. 

Thus scorning all the cares 

That fate or fortune brings. 
He makes the heaven his book, 

His wisdom heavenly things; 

Good thoughts his only friends. 
His wealth a well-spent age, 

The earth his sober inn 
And quiet pilgrimage. 

T. Campion 

LXXX 

THE LESSONS OF NATURE 

Of this fair volume which we World do name 
If we the sheets and leaves could turn with care, 



100 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Of Him who it corrects, and did it frame, 
We clear might read the art and wisdom rare: 

Find out His power which wildest powers doth tame, 

His providence extending everjrwhere, 

His justice which proud rebels doth not spare, 

In every page, no period of the same. 

But silly we, like foolish children, rest 
Well pleased with colour'd vellum, leaves of gold, 
Fair dangling ribbands, leaving what is best, 
On the great Writer's sense ne'er taking hold; 

Or if by chance we stay our minds on aught, 
It is some picture on the margin wrought. 

W. Drummond 

LXXXI 

Doth then the world go thus, doth all thus move? 
Is this the justice which on earth we find? 
Is this that firm decree which all doth bind? 
Are these your influences. Powers above? 

Those souls which vice's moody mists most blind, 
Blind Fortune, blindly, most their friend doth prove; 
And they who thee, poor idol Virtue! love. 
Ply like a feather toss'd by storm and wind. 

Ah ! if a Providence doth sway this all 
Why should best minds groan under most distress? 
Or why should pride humility make thrall, 
And injuries the innocent oppress? 



BOOK FIRST 101 

Heavens! hinder, stop this fate; or grant a time 
When good may have, as well as bad, their prime! 

W. Drummond 

LXXXII 

THE WORLD'S WAY 

Tired with all these, for restful death I cry — 
As, to behold desert a beggar born. 
And needy nothing trimm'd in jollity, 
And purest faith unhappily forsworn, 

And gilded honour shamefully misplaced, 
And maiden virtue rudely strumpeted. 
And right perfection wrongfully disgraced, 
And strength by limping sway disabled. 

And art made tongue-tied by authority. 
And folly, doctor-like, controlling skill. 
And simple truth miscall'd simplicity. 
And captive Good attending captain 111 : — 

— Tired with all these, from these would I be gone. 
Save that, to die, I leave my Love alone. 

W. Shakespeare 

Lxxxni 

A WISH 

Happy were he could finish forth his fate 
In some unhaunted desert, where, obscure 
From all society, from love and hate 
Of worldly folk, there should he sleep secure; 



102 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Then wake again, and yield God ever praise; 
Content with hip, with haws, and brambleberry; 
In contemplation passing still his days, 
And change of holy thoughts to make him merry: 

Who, when he dies, his tomb might be the bush 
Where harmless robin resteth with the thrush : 
— Happy were he! 

R. Devereux, Earl of Essex 



LXXXIV 

SAINT JOHN BAPTIST 

The last and greatest Herald of Heaven's King 
Girt with rough skins, hies to the deserts wild. 
Among that savage brood the woods forth bring, 
Which he more harmless found than man, and mild. 

His food was locusts, and what there doth spring, 
With honey that from virgin hives distilFd; 
Parch'd body, hollow eyes, some uncouth thing 
Made him appear, long since from earth exiled. 

There burst he forth : All ye whose hopes rely 
On God, with me amidst these deserts mourn, 
Repent, repent, and from old errors turn! 
— Who listen'd to his voice, obey'd his cry? 

Only the echoes, which he made relent. 
Rung from their flinty caves, Repent ! Repent ! 

W. Drummond 



BOOK SECOND 



LXXXV 

ODE ON THE MORNING OF CHRIST'S 
NATIVITY 

This is the month, and this the happy morn 

Wherein the Son of Heaven's Eternal King 

Of wedded maid and virgin mother born, 

Our great redemption from above did bring; 

For so the holy sages once did sing 

That He our deadly forfeit should release. 

And with His Father work us a perpetual peace. 

That glorious Form, that Light unsufferable, 

And that far-beaming blaze of Majesty 

Wherewith He .wont at Heaven's high council-table 

To sit the midst of Trinal Unity, 

He laid aside; and, here with us to be, 

Forsook the courts of everlasting day, 

And chose with us a darksome house of mortal clay. 

Say, heavenly Muse, shall not thy sacred vein 
Afford a present to the Infant God? 

103 



THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Hast thou no verse, no hymn, or solemn strain 
To welcome Him to this His new abode, 
Now while the heaven, by the sun's team untrod, 
Hath took no print of the approaching light. 
And all the spangled host keep watch in squadrons 
bright? 

See how from far, upon the eastern road. 

The star-led wizards haste with odours sweet: 

O run, prevent them with thy humble ode 

And lay it lowly at His blessed feet; 

Have thou the honour first thy Lord to greet, 

And join thy voice unto the Angel quire 

From out His secret altar touch'd with hallow'd fire. 

The Hymn 

It was the winter wild 

While the heaven-born Child 

All meanly wrapt in the rude manger lies; 

Nature in awe to Him 

Had doff'd her gaudy trim, 

With her great Master so to sympathize: 

It was no season then for her 

To wanton with the sun, her lusty paramour. 

Only with speeches fair 

She woos the gentle air 

To hide her guilty front with innocent snow; 

And on her naked shame. 

Pollute with sinful blame, 



BOOK SECOND 

The saintly veil of maiden white to throw; 

Confounded, that her Maker's eyes 

Should look so near upon her foul deformities. 

But He, her fears to cease, 

Sent down the meek-eyed Peace; 

She, crown'd with olive green, came softly sliding 

Dow^ through the turning sphere, 

His ready harbinger. 

With turtle wing the amorous clouds dividing; 

And waving wide her myrtle wand. 

She strikes a universal peace through sea and land. 

No war, or battle's sound 

Was heard the world around : 

The idle spear and shield were high uphung; 

The hooked chariot stood 

Unstain'd with hostile blood ; 

The trumpet spake not to the armed throng; 

And kings sat still with awful eye. 

As if they surely knew their sovran Lord was by. 

But peaceful was the night 
Wherein the Prince of Light 
His reign of peace upon the earth began: 
The winds, with wonder whist. 
Smoothly the waters kist 
Whispering new joys to the mild ocean — 
Who now hath quite forgot to rave. 
While birds of calm sit brooding on the charmed 
wave. 



106 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

The stars, with deep amaze, 

Stand fix'd in steadfast gaze. 

Bending one way their precious influence; 

And will not take their flight 

For all the morning hght, 

Or Lucifer that often warn'd them thence; 

But in their glimmering orbs did glow 

Until their Lord Himself bespake, and bid them go. 

And though the shady gloom 

Had given day her room, 

The sun himself withheld his wonted speed, 

And hid his head for shame, 

As his inferior flame 

The new-enlighten'd world no more should need; 

He saw a greater Sun appear 

Than his bright throne, or burning axletree could bear. 

The shepherds on the lawn 

Or ere the point of dawn 

Sate simply chatting in a rustic row; 

Full little thought they than 

That the mighty Pan 

Was kindly come to live with them below; 

Perhaps their loves, or else their sheep 

Was all that did their silly thoughts so busy keep: — 

When such music sweet 

Their hearts and ears did greet 

As never was by mortal finger strook — 

Divinely-warbled voice 



BOOK SECOND 107 

Answering the stringed noise, 

As all their souls in blissful rapture took: 

The air, such pleasure loth to lose, 

With thousand echoes still prolongs each heavenly close. 

Nature, that heard such sound 

Beneath the hollow round 

Of Cynthia's seat the airy region thrilling, 

Now was almost won 

To think her part was done, 

And that her reign had here its last fulfilling; 

She knew such harmony alone 

Could hold all Heaven and Earth in happier union. 

At last surrounds their sight 

A globe of circular light 

That with long beams the shamefaced night array 'd; 

The helmed Cherubim 

And sworded Seraphim 

Are seen in glittering ranks with wings display'd. 

Harping in loud and solemn quire 

With unexpressive notes, to Heaven's new-born Heir. 

Such music (as 'tis said) 

Before was never made 

But when of old the Sons of Morning sung, 

While the Creator great 

His constellations set 

And the well-balanced world on hinges hung; 

And cast the dark foundations deep. 

And bid the weltering waves their oozy channel keep. 



108 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Ring out, ye crystal spheres! 

Once bless our human ears, 

If ye have power to touch our senses so; 

And let your silver chime 

Move in melodious time; 

And let the bass of heaven's deep organ blow; 

And with your ninefold harmony 

Make up full consort to the angelic symphony. 

For if such holy song 

Enwrap our fancy long, 

Time will run back, and fetch the age of gold; 

And speckled Vanity 

Will sicken soon and die, 

And leprous Sin will melt from earthly mould; 

And Hell itself will pass away. 

And leave her dolorous mansions to the peering day. 

Yea, Truth and Justice then 

Will down return to men, 

Orb'd in a rainbow; and, like glories wearing, 

Mercy will sit between 

Throned in celestial sheen. 

With radiant feet the tissued clouds down steering; 

And Heaven, as at some festival, 

Will open wide the gates of her high palace-hall. 

But wisest Fate says No; 

This must not yet be so; 

The Babe yet hes in smiling infancy 

That on the bitter cross 



BOOK SECOND 109 

Must redeem our loss; 
So both Himself and us to glorify: 
Yet first, to those ychain'd in sleep 
The wakeful trump of doom must thunder through 
the deep; 

With such a horrid clang 
As on Mount Sinai rang 

While the red fire and smouldering clouds outbrake: 
The aged Earth aghast 
With terror of that blast 
Shall from the surface to the centre shake, 
When, at the world's last session. 
The dreadful Judge in middle air shall spread His 
throne. 

And then at last our bliss 

Full and perfect is, 

But now begins ; for from this happy day 

The old Dragon under ground, 

In straiter limits bound, 

Not half so far casts his usurped sway; 

And, wroth to see his kingdom fail. 

Swinges the scaly horror of his folded tail. 

The Oracles are dumb; 

No voice or hideous hum 

Runs through the arched roof in words deceiving. 

Apollo from his shrine 

Can no more divine. 

With hollow shriek the steep of Delphos leaving: 



110 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

No nightly trance or breathed spell 

Inspires the pale-eyed priest from the prophetic cell. 

The lonely mountains o'er 
And the resounding shore 
A voice of weeping heard, and loud lament; 
From haunted spring and dale 
Edged with poplar pale 
The parting Genius is with sighing sent; 
With flower-inwoven tresses torn 
The Nymphs in twilight shade of tangled thickets 
mourn. 

In consecrated earth 

And on the holy hearth 

The Lars and Lemures moan with midnight plaint; 

In urns, and altars round 

A drear and dying sound 

Affrights the Flamens at their service quaint; 

And the chill marble seem-S to sweat. 

While each peculiar Power foregoes his wonted seat. 

Peor and Baalim 
Forsake their temples dim. 
With that twice-batter'd god of Palestine; 
And mooned Ashtaroth 
Heaven's queen and mother both. 
Now sits not girt with tapers' holy shine; 
The Lybic Hammon shrinks his horn: 
In vain the Tyrian maids their wounded Thammuz 
mourn. 



BOOK SECOND 111 

And sullen Moloch, fled, 

Hath left in shadows dread 

His burning idol all of blackest hue; 

In vain with cymbals' ring 

They call the grisly king. 

In dismal dance about the furnace blue; 

The brutish gods of Nile as fast, 

Isis, and Orus, and the dog Anubis, haste. 

Nor is Osiris seen 

In Memphian grove, or green, 

Trampling the unshower'd grass with lowings loud: 

Nor can he be at rest 

Within his sacred chest; 

Nought but profoundest Hell can be his shroud; 

In vain with timbrell'd anthems dark 

The sable-stoled sorcerers bear his worshipt ark. 

He feels from Juda's land 

The dreaded Infant's hand; 

The rays of Bethlehem blind his dusky eyn; 

Nor all the gods beside 

Longer dare abide. 

Not Typhon huge ending in snaky twine: 

Our Babe, to show His Godhead true, 

Can in His swaddling bands control the damned crew. 

So, when the sun in bed 

Curtain 'd with cloudy red 

Pillows his chin upon an orient wave, 

The flocking shadows pale 



112 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Troop to the infernal jail, 
Each fetter'd ghost shps to his several grave; 
And the yellow-skirted fays 

Fly after the night-steeds, leaving their moon-loved 
maze. 

But see! the Virgin blest 

Hath laid her Babe to rest; 

Time is, our tedious song should here have ending: 

Heaven's youngest-teemed star 

Hath fix'd her polish'd car, 

Her sleeping Lord with hand-maid lamp attending: 

And all about the courtly stable 

Bright-harness'd Angels sit in order serviceable. 

J. Milton 

LXXXVI 

SONG FOR ST. CECILIA'S DAY, 1687 

Fkom Harmony, from heavenly Harmony 

This universal frame began: 
When Nature underneath a heap 

Of jarring atoms lay 
And could not heave her head. 
The tuneful voice was heard from high, 

Arise, ye more than dead! 
Then cold and hot and moist and dry 
In order to their stations leap, 

And Music's power obey. 
From harmony, from heavenly harmony 

This universal frame began: 



BOOK SECOND 113 

From harmony to harmony 
Through all the compass of the notes it ran, 
The diapason closing full in Man. 

What passion cannot Music raise and quell? 
When Jubal struck the chorded shell 
His listening brethren stood around, 
And, wondering, on their faces fell 
To worship that celestial sound. 
Less than a god they thought there could not dwell 
Within the hollow of that shell 
That spoke so sweetly and so well. 
What passion cannot Music raise and quell? 

The trumpet's loud clangor 

Excites us to arms. 
With shrill notes of anger 

And mortal alarms. 
The double double double beat 

Of the thundering drum 

Cries 'Hark! the foes come; 
Charge, charge, 'tis too late to retreat!' 

The soft complaining flute 
In dying notes discovers 
The woes of hopeless lovers. 
Whose dirge is whisper'd by the warbling lute. 

Sharp violins proclaim 
Their jealous pangs and desperation, 
Fury, frantic indignation, 



114 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Depth of pains, and height of passion 
For the fair disdainful dame. 

But oh ! what art can teach, 
What human voice can reach 

The sacred organ's praise? 
Notes inspiring holy love, 
Notes that wing their heavenly ways 

To mend the choirs above. 

Orpheus could lead the savage race, 
And trees unrooted left their place 

Sequacious of the lyre: 
But bright CeciUa raised the wonder higher: 
When to her Organ vocal breath was given 
An Angel heard, and straight appear 'd — 

Mistaking Earth for Heaven. 

Grand Chorus 

As from the power of sacred lays 

The spheres began to move, 
And sung the great Creator's praise 

To all the blest above; 
So when the last and dreadful hour 
This crumbling pageant shall devour, 
The trumpet shall be heard on high, 
The dead shall live, the living die, 
And Music shall untune the sky. 

J. Dryden 



BOOK SECOND 115 

LXXXVII 

ON THE LATE MASSACRE IN PIEDMONT 

Avenge, O Lord! Thy slaughter'd saints, whose bones 
Lie scatter'd on the Alpine mountains cold; 
Even them who kept Thy truth so pure of old 
When all our fathers worshipt stocks and stones, 

Forget not : In Thy book record their groans 
Who were Thy sheep, and in their ancient fold 
Slain by the bloody Piemontese, that roll'd 
Mother with infant down the rocks. Their moans 

The vales redoubled to the hills, and they 

To Heaven. Their martyr'd blood and ashes sow 

O'er all the Italian fields, where still doth sway 

The triple Tyrant : that from these may grow 
A hundred-fold, who, having learnt Thy way, 
Early may fly the Babylonian woe. 

J. Milton 

LXXXVIII 

HORATIAN ODE UPON CROMWELL'S 
RETURN FROM IRELAND 

The forward youth that would appear, 
Must now forsake his Muses dear, 

Nor in the shadows sing 

His numbers languishing. 



116 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Tis time to leave the books in dust, 
And oil the unused armour's rust. 

Removing from the wall 

The corslet of the hall. 

So restless Cromwell could not cease 
In the inglorious arts of peace, 

But through adventurous war 

Urged his active star : 

And like the three-fork'd lightning, first 
Breaking the clouds where it was nurst, 

Did thorough his own Side 

His fiery way divide : 

For 'tis all one to courage high, 

The emulous, or enemy; 

And with such, to enclose 
Is more than to oppose; 

Then burning through the air he went 
And palaces and temples rent; 
And Caesar's head at last 
Did through his laurels blast. 

^Tis madness to resist or blame 
The face of angry heaven's flame; 
And if we would speak true. 
Much to the Man is due 

Who, from his private gardens, where 
He lived reserved and austere. 



BOOK SECOND 117 

(As if his highest plot 
To plant the bergamot,) 

Could by industrious valour climb 
To ruin the great work of time, 

And cast the Kingdoms old 

Into another mould; 

Though Justice against Fate complain, 
And plead the ancient Rights in vain — 

But those do hold or break 

As men are strong or weak; 

Nature, that hateth emptiness, 
Allows of penetration less. 

And therefore must make room 

Where greater spirits come. 

What field of all the civil war 
Where his were not the deepest scar? 

And Hampton shows what part 

He had of wiser art, 

Where, twining subtle fears with hope, 
He wove a net of such a scope 

That Charles himself might chase 

To Carisbrook's narrow case, 

That thence the Royal actor borne 
The tragic scaffold might adorn : 

While round the armed bands 

Did clap their bloody hands. 



118 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

He nothing common did or mean 
Upon that memorable scene, 
But with his keener eye 
The axe's edge did try; 

Nor call'd the Gods, with vulgar spite, 
To vindicate his helpless right; 

But bow'd his comely head 

Down, as upon a bed. 

— This was that memorable hour 
Which first assured the forced power: 
So when they did design 
The Capitol's first line, 

A Bleeding Head, where they begun, 
Did fright the architects to run; 
And yet in that the State 
Foresaw its happy fate! 

And now the Irish are ashamed 
To see themselves in one year tamed: 
So much one man can do 
That does both act and know. 

They can affirm his praises best, 
And have, though overcome, confest 
How good he is, how just 
And fit for highest trust. 

Nor yet grown stiffer with command, 
But still in the Republic's hand 



BOOK SECOND 119 

How fit he is to sway 
That can so well obey! 

He to the Commons' feet presents 
A Kingdom for his first year's rents, 

And (what he may) forbears 

His fame, to make it theirs: 

And has his sword and spoils ungirt 
To lay them at the Public's skirt. 

So when the falcon high 

Falls heavy from the sky, 

She, having kill'd, no more doth search 
But on the next green bough to perch, 

Where, when he first does lure, 

The falconer has her sure. 

— What may not then our Isle presume 
While victory his crest does plume? 

What may not others fear 

If thus he crowns each year? 

As Caesar he, ere long, to Gaul, 
To Italy an Hannibal, 

And to all States not free 

Shall chmacteric be. 

The Pict no shelter now shall find 

Within his parti-colour'd mind. 
But from this valour sad 
Shrink underneath the plaid — 



120 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Happy, if in the tufted brake 
The Enghsh hunter him mistake, 

Nor lay his hounds in near 

The Caledonian deer. 

But Thou, the War's and Fortune's son, 

March indefatigably on; 
And for the last effect 
Still keep the sword erect: 

Besides the force it has to fright 

The spirits of the shady night, 
The same arts that did gain 
A power, must it maintain. 

A. Marvell 

LXXXIX 
LYCIDAS 

Elegy on a Friend drowned in the Irish Channel 
1637 

Yet once more, O ye laurels, and once more 

Ye myrtles brown, with ivy never sere, 

I come to pluck your berries harsh and crude. 

And with forced fingers rude 

Shatter your leaves before the mellowing year. 

Bitter constraint and sad occasion dear 

Compels me to disturb your season due : 

For Lycidas is dead, dead ere his prime. 

Young Lycidas, and hath not left his peer. 

Who would not sing for Lycidas? he knew 



BOOK SECOND 121 

Himself to sing, and build the lofty rhyme. 
He must not float upon his watery bier 
Unwept, and welter to the parching wind, 
Without the meed of some melodious tear. 

Begin then, Sisters of the sacred well 
That from beneath the seat of Jove doth spring; 
Begin, and somewhat loudly sweep the string. 
Hence with denial vain and coy excuse: 
So may some gentle Muse 
With lucky words favour my destined urn; 
And as he passes, turn 
And bid fair peace be to my sable shroud. 

For we were nursed upon the self-same hill, 
Fed the same flock by fountain, shade, and rill: 
Together both, ere the high lawns appear'd 
Under the opening eyelids of the Morn, 
We drove a-field, and both together heard 
What time the gray-fly winds her sultry horn, 
Battening our flocks with the fresh dews of night, 
Oft till the star that rose at evening bright 
Toward heaven's descent had sloped his westering 

wheel. 
Meanwhile the rural ditties were not mute, 
Tempered to the oaten flute. 
Rough Satyrs danced, and Fauns with cloven heel 
From the glad sound would not be absent long; 
And old Damoetas loved to hear our song. 

But, oh! the heavy change, now thou art gone, 
Now thou art gone, and never must return! 



122 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Thee, Shepherd, thee the woods and desert caves 

With wild thyme and the gadding vine o'ergrown, 

And all their echoes, mourn: 

The willows and the hazel copses green 

Shall now no more be seen 

Fanning their joyous leaves to thy soft lays: — 

As killing as the canker to the rose. 

Or taint-worm to the weanling herds that graze, 

Or frost to flowers, that their gay wardrobe wear 

When first the white-thorn blows; 

Such, Lycidas, thy loss to shepherd's ear. 

Where were ye. Nymphs, when the remorseless deep 
Closed o'er the head of your loved Lycidas? 
For neither were ye playing on the steep 
Where your old bards, the famous Druids, lie, 
Nor on the shaggy top of Mona high, 
Nor yet where Deva spreads her wizard stream: 
Ay me ! I fondly dream — 
Had ye been there . . . For what could that have 

done? 
What could the Muse herself that Orpheus bore, 
The Muse herself, for her enchanting son. 
Whom universal nature did lament. 
When by the rout that made the hideous roar 
His gory visage down the stream was sent, 
Down the swift Hebrus to the Lesbian shore? 

Alas! what boots it with uncessant care 
To tend the homely, slighted, shepherd's trade 
And strictly meditate the thankless Muse? 



BOOK SECOND 123 

Were it not better done, as others use, 

To sport with Amarylhs in the shade, 

Or with the tangles of Neaera's hair? 

Fame is the spur that the clear spirit doth raise 

(That last infirmity of noble mind) 

To scorn delights, and live laborious days; 

But the fair guerdon when we hope to find, 

And think to burst out into sudden blaze, 

Comes the blind Fury with the abhorred shears 

And slits the thin-spun life. 'But not the praise' 

Phoebus replied, and touch'd my trembling ears; 

' Fame is no plant that grows on mortal soil. 

Nor in the glistering foil 

Set off to the world, nor in broad rumour lies: 

But fives and spreads aloft by those pure eyes 

And perfect witness of all-judging Jove; 

As he pronounces lastly on each deed. 

Of so much fame in heaven expect thy meed.' 

O fountain Arethuse, and thou honour'd flood 
Smooth-sliding Mincius, crown'd with vocal reeds. 
That strain I heard was of a higher mood. 
But now my oat proceeds. 
And listens to the herald of the sea 
That came in Neptune's plea; 
He ask'd the waves, and ask'd the felon winds. 
What hard mishap hath doom'd this gentle swain? 
And question'd every gust of rugged wings 
That blows from off each beaked promontory : 
They knew not of his story; 
And sage Hippotades their answer brings, 



124 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

That not a blast was from his dungeon stray 'd; 

The air was calm, and on the level brine 

Sleek Panope with all her sisters play'd. 

It was that fatal and perfidious bark 

Built in the eclipse, and rigg'd with curses dark, 

That sunk so low that sacred head of thine. 

Next Camus, reverend sire, went footing slow, 
His mantle hairy, and his bonnet sedge 
Inwrought with figures dim, and on the edge 
Like to that sanguine flower inscribed with woe: 
'Ah! who hath reft,' quoth he, 'my dearest pledge!* 
Last came, and last did go 
The Pilot of the Galilean lake; 
Two massy keys he bore of metals twain 
(The golden opes, the iron shuts amain) ; 
He shook his mitred locks, and stern bespake: 
' How well could I have spared for thee, young swain, 
Enow of such, as for their bellies' sake 
Creep and intrude and climb into the fold! 
Of other care they little reckoning make 
Than how to scramble at the shearers' feast, 
And shove away the worthy bidden guest. 
Blind mouths ! that scarce themselves know how to 

hold 
A sheep-hook, or have learn'd aught else the least 
That to the faithful herdman's art belongs! 
What recks it them? What need they? They are 

sped; 
And when they list, their lean and flashy songs 
Grate on their scrannel pipes of wretched straw; 



BOOK SECOND 125 

The hungry sheep look up, and are not fed, 
But swoln with wind and the rank mist they draw 
Rot inwardly, and foul contagion spread: 
Besides what the grim wolf with privy paw 
Daily devours apace, and nothing said : 
— But that two-handed engine at the door 
Stands ready to smite once, and smite no more.' 

Return, Alpheus; the dread voice is past 
That shrunk thy streams; return, Sicilian Muse, 
And call the vales, and bid them hither cast 
Their bells and flowerets of a thousand hues. 
Ye valleys low, where the mild whispers use 
Of shades, and wanton winds, and gushing brooks 
On whose fresh lap the swart star sparely looks; 
Throw hither all your quaint enamell'd eyes 
That on the green turf suck the honey'd showers 
And purple all the ground with vernal flowers. 
Bring the rathe primrose that forsaken dies, 
The tufted crow-toe, and pale jessamine. 
The white pink, and the pansy freak'd with jet. 
The glowing violet, 

The musk-rose, and the well-attired woodbine, 
With cowslips wan that hang the pensive head, 
And every flower that sad embroidery wears : 
Bid amarantus all his beauty shed, 
And daffadillies fill their cups with tears 
To strew the laureat hearse where Lycid lies. 
For so to interpose a little ease. 
Let our frail thoughts dally with false surmise : — 
Ay me! whilst thee the shores and sounding seas 



126 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Wash far away, — where'er thy bones are hurl'd, 

Whether beyond the stormy Hebrides 

Where thou perhaps, under the whelming tide, 

Visitest the bottom of the monstrous world; 

Or whether thou, to our moist vows denied, 

Sleep'st by the fable of Bellerus old. 

Where the great Vision of the guarded mount 

Looks toward Namancos and Bayona's hold, 

— Look homeward. Angel, now, and melt with ruth ; 

— And, ye dolphins, waft the hapless youth! 

Weep no more, woeful shepherds, weep no more. 
For Lycidas, your sorrow, is not dead. 
Sunk though he be beneath the watery floor: 
So sinks the day-star in the ocean-bed. 
And yet anon repairs his drooping head 
And tricks his beams, and with new-spangled ore 
Flames in the forehead of the morning sky : 
So Lycidas sunk low, but mounted high 
Through the dear might of Him that walk'd the 

waves; 
Where, other groves and other streams along, 
With nectar pure his oozy locks he laves, 
And hears the unexpressive nuptial song 
In the blest kingdoms meek of joy and love. 
There entertain him all the Saints above 
In solemn troops, and sweet societies. 
That sing, and singing, in their glory move, 
And wipe the tears for ever from his eyes. 
Now, Lycidas, the shepherds weep no more; 
Henceforth thou art the Genius of the shore 



BOOK SECOND 127 

In thy large recompense, and shalt be good 
To all that wander in that perilous flood. 

Thus sang the uncouth swain to the oaks and rills, 
While the still morn went out with sandals gray; 
He touch'd the tender stops of various quills. 
With eager thought warbling his Doric lay: 
And now the sun had stretch'd out all the hills, 
And now was dropt into the western bay : 
At last he rose, and twitch'd his mantle blue: 
To-morrow to fresh woods, and pastures new. 

J. Milton 

xc 'y 

ON THE TOMBS IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY 

Mortality, behold and fear 

What a change of flesh is here! 

Think how many royal bones 

Sleep within these heaps of stones; 

Here they lie, had realms and lands, 

Who now want strength to stir their hands, 

Where from their pulpits seal'd with dust 

They preach, 'In greatness is no trust.' 

Here's an acre sown indeed 

With the richest royallest seed 

That the earth did e'er suck in 

Since the first man died for sin: 

Here the bones of birth have cried 

'Though gods they were, as men they died!' 

Here are sands, ignoble things. 



128 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Dropt from the ruin'd sides of kings: 
Here's a world of pomp and state 
Buried in dust, once dead by fate. 

F. Beaumont 

XCI 

THE LAST CONQUEROR 

Victorious men of earth, no more 
Proclaim how wide your empires are; 

Though you bind-in every shore 
And your triumphs reach as far 

As night or day. 
Yet you, proud monarchs, must obey 

And mingle with forgotten ashes, when 

Death calls ye to the crowd of common men. 

Devouring Famine, Plague, and War 

Each able to undo mankind, 
Death's servile emissaries are; 
Nor to these alone confined, 

He hath at will 
More quaint and subtle ways to kill; 
A smile or kiss, as he will use the art. 
Shall have the cunning skill to break a heart. 

J. Shirley 

xcn 

DEATH THE LEVELLER 

The glories of our blood and state 

Are shadows, not substantial things; 



BOOK SECOND 129 

There is no armour against fate; 

Death lays his icy hand on kings: 

Sceptre and Crown 

Must tumble down, 
And in the dust be equal made 
With the poor crooked scythe and spade. 

Some men with swords may reap the field, 

And plant fresh laurels where they kill : 
But their strong nerves at last must yield; 
They tame but one another still : 
Early or late 
They stoop to fate, 
And must give up their murmuring breath 
When they, pale captives, creep to death. 

The garlands wither on your brow; 

Then boast no more your mighty deeds; 
Upon Death's purple altar now 

See where the victor- victim bleeds: 
Your heads must come 
To the cold tomb; 
Only the actions of the just 
Smell sweet, and blossom in their dust. 

J, Shirley 

XCIII 

WHEN THE ASSAULT WAS INTENDED 
TO THE CITY 

Captain, or Colonel, or Knight in Arms, 

Whose chance on these defenceless doors may seize, 



\M) TUV COl.nVX TUF.ASIRY 

If (\(\\\ o{ houiuir d\d {\wc c\c\' pl(\'ist\ 

tiiiard (hiMu. ;uul hiiu Avitliin pin>ttH'( liH^iu lianus. 

Ho oa.n r(H|uit(' tluu\ for ho knows [\\v rh:inus 
Tlinl cnll famo on surli .mailK^ ju'ls as (lu\s(\ 
Ami lir laii spri\ail thv naiiu^ o'or laiuls aiui soas, 
M hati'\(M- i'linu> {\\c sun's hritilil circK^ waiius. 

Lift not th\ s[)t\ar against tlu^ Musics' lunvta-; 

'^rht^ ii^vc'M I'niathian ('onc^ntM-or bid spait^ 

Tlu' luniso o\ rindarus, wluai ttanplc and tt)\Ma- 

^^\alt \o \\w ^rounil: anil tlu^ ropoat(\l air 

0{ sad MliM'tra's piuM hail tlu^ powta- 

To sa\o thi^ Athonian walls from ruin haiw 

J. Milton 

XCIV 

ON HIS HL1NDNE8S 

A\"hk\ I ronsidor liow n\y liiilit is spiait 
l-a-i^ half my days, in tliis ilark world and w idt\ 
And that om^ tahait winch is dt\ath to hido 
Kod^cd with \\\c nst^K^ss. thoui:;h my soul mori^ btait 

'Vo s(a-\ (^ thorowith n\> Makta-. and pn^siait 
My trui^ ai'i'ount. lest llo returning i'hid(\ — 
Doth (uhI oxat't day-labom-. lis^ht diaiiiHl? 
1 fondly ask:- l>n( rationt't\ io proviait 

That murmur, soon r(^pli(\s; (u>il dotli not \\(\\\ 
MithiM- man's woi'k, ov His own ^ifts: who luvst 
Hoar His mild vt)kt\ thov sia-vo Him luv^t : His stalo 



BOOK SECOND 131 

Is kingly; thousands at His l^idding speed 
And post o'er land and ocean without rest: — 
They also serve who only stand and wait. 

J. Milton 

xcv 

CHARACTER OF A HAPPY LIFE 

How happy is he born and taught 

That sfTveth not anothf^'s will; 
Whose armour is his honest tliought 
And simple truth his utmost skill! 

Whose passions not his masters are, 
Wliose soul is still prepared for (k^ath, 
Untied unto the world by care 
Of publie fame, or private breath; 

Who envif^s none that chance doth raise 
Nor vi(;(;; Who never understood 
How deepest wounds are given })y praise; 
Nor rules of state, but rules of good: 

Who hath his life from rumours freed. 
Whose conscience is his strong retreat; 
Whose state can neither flatterers feed, 
Nor ruin make oppressors great; 

Who God doth late and early pray 
More of His grace than gifts to lend; 
And entertains the harmless day 
With a religious book or friend; 



132 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

— This man is freed from servile bands 
Of hope to rise, or fear to fall; 
Lord of himself, though not of lands; 
And having nothing, yet hath all. 

Sir H. Wotton 

XCVI 

THE NOBLE NATURE 

It is not growing like a tree 
In bulk, doth make Man better be; 
Or standing long an oak, three hundred year, 
To fall a log at last, dry, bald, and sere: 
A Uly of a day 
Is fairer far in May, 
Although it fall and die that night — 
It was the plant and flower of Light. 
In small proportions we just beauties see; 
And in short measures life may perfect be. 

B. Jonson 

XCVII 
THE GIFTS OF GOD 

When God at first made Man, 
Having a glass of blessings standing by; 
Let us (said He) pour on him all we can: 
Let the world's riches, which dispersed lie, 

Contract into a span. 

So strength first made a way; 
Then beauty flow'd, then wisdom, honour, pleasure; 



BOOK SECOND 133 

When almost all was out, God made a stay, 
Perceiving that alone, of all His treasure. 
Rest in the bottom lay. 

For if I should (said He) 
Bestow this jewel on My creature, 
He would adore My gifts instead of Me, 
And rest in Nature, not the God of Nature, 

So both should losers be. 

Yet let him keep the rest. 
But keep them with repining restlessness: 
Let him be rich and weary, that at least. 
If goodness lead him not, yet weariness 

May toss him to My breast. 

G. Herbert 

XCVIII 

THE RETREAT 

Happy those early days, when I 
Shined in my Angel-infancy! 
Before I understood this place 
Appointed for my second race. 
Or taught my soul to fancy aught 
But a white, celestial thought; 
When yet I had not walk'd above 
A mile or two from my first Love, 
And looking back, at that short space 
Could see a glimpse of His bright face; 
When on some gilded cloud or flower 



134 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

My gazing soul would dwell an hour, 
And in those weaker glories spy 
Some shadows of eternity; 
Before I taught my tongue to wound 
My conscience with a sinful sound, 
Or had the black art to dispense 
A several sin to every sense, 
But felt through all this fleshly dress 
Bright shoots of everlastingness. 

O how I long to travel back, 
And tread again that ancient track! 
That I might once more reach that plain 
Where first I left my glorious train; 
From whence th' enlighten'd spirit sees 
That shady City of palm trees! 
But ah! my soul with too much stay 
Is drunk, and staggers in the way : — 
Some men a forward motion love. 
But I by backward steps would move; 
And when this dust falls to the urn, 
In that state I came, return. 

H, Vaughan 

XCIX 

TO MR. LAWRENCE 

Lawrence, of virtuous father virtuous son. 
Now that the fields are dank and ways are mire, 
Where shall we sometimes meet, and by the fire 
Help waste a sullen day, what may be won 



BOOK SECOND 135 

From the hard season gaining? Time will run 
On smoother, till Favonius re-inspire 
The frozen earth, and clothe in fresh attire 
The lily and rose, that neither sow'd nor spun. 

What neat repast shall feast us, light and choice, 
Of Attic taste, with wine, whence we may rise 
To hear the lute well touch'd, or artful voice 

Warble immortal notes and Tuscan air? 

He who of those delights can judge, and spare 

To interpose them oft, is not unwise. 

J. Milton 



C 

TO CYRIACK SKINNER 

Cyriack, whose grandsire, on the royal bench 
Of British Themis, with no mean applause 
Pronounced, and in his volumes taught, our laws, 
Which others at their bar so often wrench ; 

To-day deep thoughts resolve with me to drench 

In mirth, that after no repenting draws; 

Let Euclid rest, and Archimedes pause. 

And what the Swede intend, and what the French. 

To measure life learn thou betimes, and know 
Toward solid good what leads the nearest way; 
For other things mild Heaven a time ordains, 



136 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

And disapproves that care, though wise in show, 
That with superfluous burden loads the day, 
And when God sends a cheerful hour, refrains. 

J. Milton 

CI 

A HYMN IN PRAISE OF NEPTUNE 

Of Neptune's empire let us sing. 
At whose command the waves obey; 
To whom the rivers tribute pay, 
Down the high mountains sliding; 
To whom the scaly nation yields 
Homage for the crystal fields 
Wherein they dwell; 
And every sea-god pays a gem 
Yearly out of his watery cell. 
To deck great Neptune's diadem. 

The Tritons dancing in a ring. 

Before his palace gates do make 

The water with their echoes quake. 

Like the great thunder sounding: 

The sea-nymphs chaunt their accents shrill, 

And the Syrens taught to kill 

With their sweet voice. 
Make every echoing rock reply. 
Unto their gentle murmuring noise. 
The praise of Neptune's empery. 

T. Campion 



BOOK SECOND 137 

CII 

HYMN TO DIANA 

Queen and Huntress, chaste and fair, 

Now the sun is laid to sleep, 
Seated in thy silver chair 

State in wonted manner keep : 

Hesperus entreats thy light, 
Goddess excellently bright. 

Earth, let not thy envious shade 

Dare itself to interpose; 
Cynthia's shining orb was made 

Heaven to clear when day did close: 

Bless us then with wished sight. 
Goddess excellently bright. 

Lay thy bow of pearl apart 

And thy crystal-shining quiver; 
Give unto the flying hart 

Space to breathe, how short soever: 

Thou that mak'st a day of night, 
Goddess excellently bright! 

B. Jonson 

cni 

WISHES FOR THE SUPPOSED MISTRESS 

Whoe'er she be, 

That not impossible She 

That shall command my heart and me; 



138 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Where'er she lie, 

Lock'd up from mortal eye 

In shady leaves of destiny: 

Till that ripe jDirth 

Of studied Fate stand forth, 

And teach her fair steps tread our earth; 

Till that divine 

Idea take a shrine 

Of crystal flesh, through which to shine: 

— Meet you her, my Wishes, 

Bespeak her to my blisses, 

And be ye call'd, my absent kisses. 

I wish her beauty 

That owes not all its duty 

To gaudy tire, or glist'ring shoe-tie: 

Something more than 
Taffata or tissue can, 
Or rampant feather, or rich fan. 

A face that's best 

By its own beauty drest, 

And can alone commend the rest: 

A face made up 

Out of no other shop 

Than what Nature's white hand sets ope. 



BOOK SECOND 139 

Sidneian showers 

Of sweet discourse, whose powers 

Can crown old Winter's head with flowers. 

Whatever dehght 

Can make day's forehead bright 

Or give down to the wings of night. 

Soft silken hours, 

Open suns, shady bowers; 

'Bove all, nothing within that lowers. 

Days, that need borrow 

No part of their good morrow 

From a fore-spent night of sorrow: 

Days, that in spite 

Of darkness, by the light 

Of a clear mind are day all night. 

Life, that dares send 

A challenge to his end. 

And when it comes, say, ^Welcome, friend.' 

I wish her store 

Of worth may leave her poor 

Of wishes; and I wish — no more. 

— Now, if Time knows 

That Her, whose radiant brows 

Weave them a garland of my vows; 



140 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Her that dares be 

What these lines wish to see: 

I seek no further, it is She. 

Tis She, and here 

Lo! I unclothe and clear 

My wishes' cloudy character. 

Such worth as this is 
Shall fix my flying wishes, 
And determine them to kisses. 

Let her full glory. 

My fancies, fly before ye; 

Be ye my fictions: — but her story. 

R. Crashaw 

CIV 

THE GREAT ADVENTURER 

Over the mountains 
And over the waves, 
Under the fountains 
And under the graves; 
Under floods that are deepest, 
Which Neptune obey; 
Over rocks that are steepest 
Love will find out the way. 

Where there is no place 
For the glow-worm to lie; 



BOOK SECOND 141 

Where there is no space 

For receipt of a fly; 

Where the midge dares not venture 

Lest herself fast she lay; 

If love come, he will enter 

And soon find out his way. 

You may esteem him 

A child for his might; 

Or you may deem him 

A coward from his flight; 

But if she whom love doth honour 

Be conceal'd from the day, 

Set a thousand guards upon her, 

Love will find out the way. 

Some think to lose him 
By having him confined; 
And some do suppose him, 
Poor thing, to be blind; 
But if ne'er so close ye wall him, 
Do the best that you may, 
Blind love, if so ye call him, 
Will find out his way. 

You may train the eagle 
To stoop to your fist; 
Or you may inveigle 
The phoenix of the east; 
The lioness, ye may move her 
To give o'er her prey; 



142 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

But you'll ne'er stop a lover: 
He will find out his way. 

Anon. 

CV 

THE PICTURE OF LITTLE T.C. IN A 
PROSPECT OF FLOWERS 

See with what simplicity 

This nymph begins her golden days! 

In the green grass she loves to lie, 

And there with her fair aspect tames 

The wilder flowers, and gives them names: 

But only with the roses plays. 

And them does tell 
What colours best become them, and what smell. 

Who can foretell for what high cause 
This darling of the Gods was born? 
Yet this is she whose chaster laws 
The wanton Love shall one day fear, 
And, under her command severe, 
See his bow broke, and ensigns torn. 
Happy who can 
Appease this virtuous enemy of man ! 

then let me in time compound 
And parley with those conquering eyes, 
Ere they have tried their force to wound; 
Ere with their glancing wheels they drive 
In triumph over hearts that strive, 



BOOK SECOND 143 

And them that yield but more despise : 
Let me be laid, 
Where I may see the glories from some shade. 

Mean time, whilst every verdant thing 
Itself does at thy beauty charm, 
Reform the errors of the Spring; 
Make that the tulips may have share 
Of sweetness, seeing they are fair, 
And roses of their thorns disarm; 

But most procure 
That violets may a longer age endure. 

But young beauty of the woods, 
Whom Nature courts with fruits and flowers, 
Gather the flowers, but spare the buds; 
Lest Flora, angry at thy crime 
To kill her infants in their prime, 
Should quickly make th' example yours; 
And ere we see — 
Nip in the blossom — r all our hopes and thee. 

A. Marvell 

CVI 
CHILD AND MAIDEN 

Ah, Chloris! could I now but sit 

As unconcern'd as when 
Your infant beauty could beget 

No happiness or pain! 
When I the dawn used to admire, 



144 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

And praised the coming day, 
I little thought the rising fire 
Would take my rest away. 

Your charms in harmless childhood lay 

Like metals in a mine; 
Age from no face takes more away 

Than youth conceal'd in thine. 
But as your charms insensibly 

To their perfection prest, 
So love as unperceived did fly, 

And center'd in my breast. 

My passion with your beauty grew, 

While Cupid at my heart, 
Still as his mother favour'd you, 

Threw a new flaming dart; 
Each gloried in their wanton part; 

To make a lover, he 
Employed the utmost of his art — 

To make a beauty, she. 

Sir C. Sedley 

CVII 
CONSTANCY 

I CANNOT change, as others do, 
Though you unjustly scorn. 

Since that poor swain that sighs for you, 
For you alone was born; 

No, Phyllis, no, your heart to move 



BOOK SECOND 145 

A surer way I'll try, — 
And to revenge my slighted love, 
Will still love on, and die. 

When, kill'd with grief, Amintas lies. 

And you to mind shall call 
The sighs that now unpitied rise, 

The tears that vainly fall, 
That welcome hour that ends his smart 

Will- then begin your pain. 
For such a faithful tender heart 

Can never break in vain. 

J. Wilmot, Earl of Rochester 

CVIII 
COUNSEL TO GIRLS 

Gather ye rose-buds while ye may, 

Old Time is still a-flying: 
And this same flower that smiles to-day, 

To-morrow will be dying. 

The glorious Lamp of Heaven, the Sun, 

The higher he's a-getting 
The sooner will his race be run. 

And nearer he's to setting. 

That age is best which is the first. 
When youth and blood are warmer; 

But being spent, the worse, and worst 
Times, still succeed the former. 



146 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Then be not coy, but use your time; 

And while ye may, go marry: 
For having lost but once your prime, 

You may for ever tarry. 

R. Herrick 

CIX 
TO LUCASTA, ON GOING TO THE WARS 

Tell me not, Sweet, I am unkind 

That from the nunnery 
Of thy chaste breast and quiet mind, 

To war and arms I fly. 

True, a new mistress now I chase, 

The first foe in the field; 
And with a stronger faith embrace 

A sword, a horse, a shield. 

Yet this inconstancy is such 

As you too shall adore; 
I could not love thee, Dear, so much, 

Loved I not Honour more. 

Colonel Lovelace 

CX 

ELIZABETH OF BOHEMIA 

You meaner beauties of the night, 

That poorly satisfy our eyes 
More by your number than your light. 



BOOK SECOND 147 

You common people of the skies, 
What are you, when the Moon shall rise? 

You curious chanters of the wood 
That warble forth dame Nature's lays, 

Thinking your passions understood 

By your weak accents; what's your praise 

When Philomel her voice doth raise? 

You violets that first appear. 
By your pure purple mantles known 

Like the proud virgins of the year, 
As if the spring were all your own, — 

What are you, when the Rose is blown? 

So when my Mistress shall be seen 

In form and beauty of her mind, 
By virtue first, then choice, a Queen, 

Tell me, if she were not design'd 
Th' eclipse and glory of her kind? 

Sir H. Wotton 

CXI 

TO THE LADY MARGARET LEY 

Daughter to that good Earl, once President 
Of England's Council and her Treasury, 
Who lived in both, unstain'd with gold or fee. 
And left them both, more in himself content. 

Till the sad breaking of that Parliament 
Broke him, as that dishonest victory 



148 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

At Chaeroneia, fatal to liberty, 

Kill'd with report that old man eloquent; — 

Though later born than to have known the days 
Wherein your father flourish'd, yet by you, 
Madam, methinks I see him living yet; 

So well your words his noble virtues praise, 
That all both judge you to relate them true. 
And to possess them, honour'd Margaret. 

J. Milton 

CXII 
THE TRUE BEAUTY 

He that loves a rosy cheek 

Or a coral Up admires, 
Or from star-like eyes doth seek 

Fuel to maintain his tires; 
As old Time makes these 'decay, 
So his flames must waste away. 

But a smooth and steadfast mind, 
Gentle thoughts, and calm desires, 

Hearts with equal love combined, 
Kindle never-dying fires: — 

Where these are not, I despise 

Lovely cheeks or lips or eyes. 

T, Carew 



BOOK SECOND 149 

CXIII 

TO DIANEME 

Sweet, be not proud of those two eyes 
Which starhke sparkle in their skies; 
Nor be you proud, that you can see 
All hearts your captives; yours yet free; 
Be you not proud of that rich hair 
Which wantons with the lovesick air; 
Whenas that ruby which you wear. 
Sunk from the tip of your soft ear, 
Will last to be a precious stone 
When all your world of beauty's gone. 

R. Her rick 

CXIV 

Love in thy youth, fair Maid, be wise; 

Old Time will make thee colder, 
And though each morning new arise 

Yet we each day grow older. 
Thou as Heaven art fair and young. 

Thine eyes like twin stars shining, 
But ere another day be sprung 

All these will be declining. 
Then winter comes with all his fears, 

And all thy sweets shall borrow; 
Too late then wilt thou shower thy tears, — 

And I too late shall sorrow! 

Anon, 



150 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

cxv 

Go, lovely Rose! 
Tell her, that wastes her time and me, 

That now she knows. 
When I resemble her to thee, 
How sweet and fair she seems to be. 

Tell her that's young 
And shuns to have her graces spied, 

That hadst thou sprung 
In deserts, where no men abide, 
Thou must have uncommended died. 

Small is the worth 
Of beauty from the light retired: 

Bid her come forth. 
Suffer herself to be desired. 
And not blush so to be admired. 

Then die ! that she 
The common fate of all things rare 

May read in thee: 
How small a part of time they share 
That are so wondrous sweet and fair! 

E. Waller 

CXVI 

TO CELIA 

Drink to me only with thine eyes, 
And I will pledge with mine; 



BOOK SECOND 151 

Or leave a kiss but in the cup 

And I'll not look for wine. 
The thirst that from the soul doth rise 

Doth ask a drink divine; 
But might I of Jove's nectar sup, 

I would not change for thine. 

I sent thee late a rosy wreath, 

Not so much honouring thee 
As giving it a hope that there 

It could not wither'd be; 
But thou thereon didst only breathe 

And sent'st it back to me; 
Since when it grows, and smells, I swear, 

Not of itself but thee! 

B. Jonson 

CXVII 
CHERRY-RIPE 

There is a garden in her face 

Where roses and white lilies blow; 

A heavenly paradise is that place. 
Wherein all pleasant fruits do grow; 

There cherries grow that none may buy, 

Till Cherry-Ripe themselves do cry. 

Those cherries fairly do enclose 

Of orient pearl, a double row. 
Which when her lovely laughter shows. 

They look like rose-buds fill'd with snow: 



152 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Yet them no peer nor prince may buy, 
Till Cherry-Ripe themselves do cry. 

Her eyes like angels watch them still; 

Her brows like bended bows do stand, 
Threatening with piercing frowns to kill 

All that approach with eye or hand 
These sacred cherries to come nigh, 
Till Cherry-Ripe themselves do cry! 

Anon, 

CXVIII 

CORINNA'S MAYING 

Get up, get up for shame ! The blooming morn 
Upon her wings presents the god unshorn. 
See how Aurora throws her fair • 
Fresh-quilted colours through the air: 
Get up, sweet Slug-a-bed, and see 
The dew bespangling herb and tree. 
Each flower has wept, and bow'd toward the east, 
Above an hour since; yet you not drest. 
Nay! not so much as out of bed? 
When all the birds have matins said, 
And sung their thankful hymns: 'tis sin, 
Nay, profanation, to keep in, — 
Whenas a thousand virgins on this day, 
Spring, sooner than the lark, to fetch-in May. 

Rise; and put on your foliage, and be seen 

To come forth, like the Spring-time, fresh and green 



BOOK SECOND 153 

And sweet as Flora. Take no care 

For jewels for your gown, or hair : 

Fear not; the leaves will strew 

Gems in abundance upon you : 
Besides, the childhood of the day has kept, 
Against you come, some orient pearls unwept: 

Come, and receive them while the light 

Hangs on the dew-locks of the night : 

And Titan on the eastern hill 

Retires himself, or else stands still 
Till you come forth. Wash, dress, be brief in 

praying: 
Few beads are best, when once we go a-Maying. 

Come, my Corinna, come; and coming, mark 
How each field turns a street; each street a park 

Made green, and trimm'd with trees: see how 

Devotion gives each house a bough 

Or branch : Each porch, each door, ere this, 

An ark, a tabernacle is, 
Made up of white-thorn neatly interwove; 
As if here were those cooler shades of love. 

Can such delights be in the street. 

And open fields, and we not see't? 

Come we'll abroad : and let's obey 

The proclamation made for May: 
And sin no more, as we have done, by staying; 
But, my Corinna, come, let's go a-Maying. 

There's not a budding boy, or girl, this day, 
But is got up, and gone to bring in May. 



154 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

A deal of youth, ere this, is come 

Back, and with white-thorn laden home. 

Some have despatch'd their cakes and cream, 

Before that we have left to dream: 
And some have wept, and woo'd, and plighted troth. 
And chose their priest, ere we can cast off sloth: 

Many a green-gown has been given; 

Many a kiss, both odd and even: 

Many a glance too has been sent 

From out the eye. Love's firmament: 
Many a jest told of the keys betraying 
This night, and locks pick'd : — Yet we're not 
a-Maying. 

— Come, let us go, while we are in our prime; 
And take the harmless folly of the time! 

We shall grow old apace, and die 

Before we know our liberty. 

Our life is short; and our days run 

As fast away as does the sun : — 
And as a vapour, or a drop of rain 
Once lost, can ne'er be found again: 

So when or you or I are made 

A fable, song, or fleeting shade; 

All love, all liking, all delight 

Lies drown'd with us in endless night. 
Then while time serves, and we are but decaying, 
Come, my Corinna! come, let's go a-Maying. 

R. Herrick 



BOOK SECOND 155 

CXIX 

THE POETRY OF DRESS 

1 

A SWEET disorder in the dress 
Kindles in clothes a wantonness : — 
A lawn about the shoulders thrown 
Into a fine distraction, — 
An erring lace, which here and there 
Enthrals the crimson stomacher, — 
A cuff neglectful, and thereby 
Ribbands to flow confusedly, — 
A winning wave, deserving note, 
In the tempestuous petticoat, — 
A careless shoe-string, in whose tie 
I see a wild civility, — 
Do more bewitch me, than when art 
Is too precise in every part. 

R. Herrick 

CXX 

2 

Whenas in silks my Julia goes 

Then, then (methinks) how sweetly flows 

That liquefaction of her clothes. 

Next, when I cast mine eyes and see 
That brave vibration each way free; 
how that glittering taketh me ! 

R. Herrick 



156 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

CXXI 

3 

My Love in her attire doth shew her wit, 

It doth so well become her : 
For every season she hath dressings fit, 

For Winter, Spring, and Summer. 
No beauty she doth miss 
When all her robes are on: 
But Beauty's self she is 
When all her robes are gone. 

Anon, 

CXXII 

ON A GIRDLE 

That which her slender waist confined 
Shall now my joyful temples bind: 
No monarch but would give his crown 
His arms might do what this has done. 

It was my Heaven's extremest sphere, 
The pale which held that lovely deer 
My joy, my grief, my hope, my love 
Did all within this circle move. 

A narrow compass ! and yet there 
Dwelt all that's good, and all that's fair: 
Give me but what this ribband bound, 
Take all the rest the Sun goes round. 

E. Waller 



BOOK SECOND 157 

CXXIII 
A MYSTICAL ECSTASY 

E'en like two little bank-dividing brooks, 

That wash the pebbles with their wanton streams, 

And having ranged and search'd a thousand nooks, 
Meet both at length in silver-breasted Thames, 
Where in a greater current they conjoin: 

So I my Best-Beloved's am; so He is mine. 

E'en so we met; and after long pursuit. 

E'en so we join'd; we both became entire; 

No need for either to renew a suit, 

For I was flax and he was flames of fire: 
Our firm-unite(-^ souls did more than twine; 

So I my Best-Belo'Ci^.d's am; so He is mine. 

If all those glittering Monarchs that command 
The servile quarters of this earthly ball, 

Should tender, in exchange, their shares of land, 
I would not change my fortunes for them all : 
Their wealth is but a counter to my coin: 

The world's but theirs; but my Beloved's mine. 

F. Quarks 

CXXIV 

TO ANTHEA WHO MAY COMMAND HIM 
ANY THING 

Bid me to live, and I will live 
Thy Protestant to be: 



158 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Or bid me love, and I will give 
A loving heart to thee. 

A heart as soft, a heart as kind, 
A heart as sound and free 

As in the whole world thou canst find, 
That heart I'll give to thee. 

Bid that heart stay, and it will stay, 
\ To honour thy decree: 
Or bid it languish quite away. 
And 't shall do so for thee. 

Bid me to weep, and I will weep 
While I have eyes to s ^e : 

And having none, yet I ^ill keep 
A heart to weep for thtj. 

Bid me despair, and I'll despair, 
Under that cypress tree: 

Or bid me die, and I will dare 
E'en Death, to die for thee. 

Thou art my life, my love, my heart, 

The very eyes of me. 
And hast command of every part. 

To live and die for thee. 

R. Herrick 



BOOK SECOND 159 



CXXV 



Love not me for comely grace, 
For my pleasing eye or face, 
Nor for any outward part, 
No, nor for my constant heart. 

For those may fail, or turn to ill, 
So thou and I shall sever: 
Keep therefore a true woman's eye, 
And love me still, but know not why — • 

So hast thou the same reason still 
To doat upon me ever! 



Anon. 



CXXVI 



Not, CeHa, that I juster am 

Or better than the rest; 
For I would change each hour, hke them, 

Were not my heart at rest. 

But I am tied to very thee 

By every thought I have; 
Thy face I only care to see. 

Thy heart I only crave. 

All that in woman is adored 

In thy dear self I find — 
For the whole sex can but afford 

The handsome and the kind. 

Why then should I seek further store. 
And still make love anew? 



160 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

When change itself can give no more, 
Tis easy to be true. 

Sir C. Sedley 

CXXVII 
TO ALTHEA FROM PRISON 

When Love with unconfined wings 

Hovers within my gates, 
And my divine Althea brings 

To whisper at the grates; 
When I he tangled in her hair 

And fetter'd to her eye, 
The Gods that wanton in the air 

Know no such hberty. 

When flowing cups run swiftly round 

With no allaying Thames, 
Our careless heads with roses bound, 

Our hearts with loyal flames; 
When thirsty grief in wine we steep. 

When healths and draughts go free — 
Fishes that tipple in the deep 

Know no such liberty. 

When, (like committed linnets), I 
With shriller throat shall sing 

The sweetness, mercy, majesty 
And glories of my King; 

When I shall voice aloud how good 
He is, how great should be, 



BOOK SECOND 161 

Enlarged winds, that curl the flood, 
Know no such liberty. 

Stone walls do not a prison make, 

Nor iron bars a cage; 
Minds innocent and quiet take 

That for an hermitage; 
If I have freedom in my love 

And in my soul am free. 
Angels alone, that soar above. 

Enjoy such liberty. 

Colonel Lovelace 



CXXVIII 

TO LUCASTA, GOING BEYOND THE 

SEAS 

If to be absent were to be 
Away from thee; 
Or that when I am gone 
You or I were alone; 
Then, my Lucasta, might I crave 
Pity from blustering wind, or swallowing wave. 

But ril not sigh one blast or gale 
To swell my sail, 
Or pay a tear to 'suage 
The foaming blue-god's rage; 
For whether he will let me pass 
Or no, I'm still as happy as I was. 



/ 



162 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Though seas and land betwixt us both, 
Our faith and troth, 
Like separated souls, 
All time and space controls: 
Above the highest sphere we meet 
Unseen, unknown, and greet as Angels greet. 

So then we do anticipate 
Our after-fate, 
And are alive i' the skies, 
If thus our lips and eyes 
Can speak like spirits unconfined 
In Heaven, their earthy bodies left behind. 

Colonel Lovelace 

CXXIX 
ENCOURAGEMENTS TO A LOVER 

Why so pale and wan, fond lover? 

Prythee, why so pale? 
Will, if looking well can't move her, 

Looking ill prevail? 

Prythee, why so pale? 

Why so dull and mute, young sinner? 

Prythee, why so mute? 
Will, when speaking well can't win her, 

Saying nothing do't? 

Prythee, why so mute? 

Quit, quit, for shame! this will not move, 
This cannot take her; 



BOOK SECOND 163 

If of herself she will not love, 
Nothing can make her: 
TheD—1 take her! 

Sir J. Suckling 

cxxx 

A SUPPLICATION 

Awake, awake, my Lyre! 
And tell thy silent master's humble tale 

In sounds that may prevail; 
Sounds that gentle thoughts inspire : 

Though so exalted she 

And I so lowly be 
Tell her, such different notes make all thy harmony. 

Hark, how the strings awake! 
And, though the moving hand approach not near. 

Themselves with awful fear 
A kind of numerous trembling make. 

Now all thy forces try; 

Now all thy charms apply; 
Revenge upon her ear the conquests of her eye. 

Weak Lyre ! thy virtue sure 
Is useless here, since thou art only found 

To cure, but not to wound. 
And she to wound, but not to cure. 

Too weak too wilt thou prove 

My passion to remove; 
Physic to other ills, thou'rt nourishment to Love. 



164 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Sleep, sleep again, my Lyre! 
For thou canst never tell my humble tale 
In sounds that will prevail, 
Nor gentle thoughts in her inspire; 
All thy vain mirth lay by, 
Bid thy strings silent lie. 
Sleep, sleep again, my Lyre, and let thy master die. 

A. Cowley 

CXXXI 

THE MANLY HEART 

Shall I, wasting in despair, 

Die because a woman's fair? 

Or make pale my cheeks with care 

'Cause another's rosy are? 

Be she fairer than the day 

Or the flowery meads in May — 
If she think not well of me 
What care I how fair she be? 

Shall my silly heart be pined 

'Cause I see a woman kind; 

Or a well disposed nature 

Joined with a lovely feature? 

Be she meeker, kinder than 

Turtle-dove or pelican. 
If she be not so to me 
What care I how kind she be? 

Shall a woman's virtues move 
Me to perish for her love? 



BOOK SECOND 165 

Or her well-deservings known 

Make me quite forget mine own? 

Be she with that goodness blest 

Which may merit name of Best; 
If she be not such to me, 
What care I how good she be? 

'Cause her fortune seems too high, 
Shall I play the fool and die? 
She that bears a noble mind 
If not outward helps she find, 
Thinks what with them he would do 
Who without them dares her woo; 
And unless that mind I see. 
What care I how great she be? 

Great or good, or kind or fair, 

I will ne'er the more despair; 

If she love me, this believe, 

I will die ere she shall grieve; 

If she slight me when I woo, 

I can scorn and let her go; 
For if she be not for me. 
What care I for whom she be? 

G. Wither 

CXXXII 

MELANCHOLY 

Hence, all you vain delights, 
As short as are the nights 



166 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Wherein you spend your folly: 

There's nought in this life sweet 

If man were wise to see't, 

But only melancholy, 

O sweetest Melancholy! 
Welcome, folded arms, and fix^d eyes, 
A sigh that piercing mortifies, 
A look that's fasten'd to the ground, 
A tongue chain'd up without a sound! 
Fountain-heads and pathless groves. 
Places which pale passion loves ! 
Moonlight walks, when all the fowls 
Are warmly housed save bats and owls! 
A midnight bell, a parting groan! 
These are the sounds we feed upon; 
Then stretch our bones in a still gloomy valley; 
Nothing's so dainty sweet as lovely melancholy. 

J. Fletcher 



CXXXIII 
FORSAKEN 

WALY waly up the bank, 

And waly waly down the brae, 
And waly waly yon burn-side 

Where I and my Love wont to gae! 

1 leant my back unto an aik, 

I thought it was a trusty tree; 
But first it bow'd, and syne it brak, 
Sae my true Love did lichtly me. 



BOOK SECOND 167 

O waly waly, but love be bonny 

A little time while it is new; 
But when 'tis auld, it waxeth cauld 

And fades awa' like morning dew. 
O wherefore should I busk my head? 

Or wherefore should I kame my hair? 
For my true Love has me forsook, 

And says he'll never loe me mair. 

Now Arthur-seat sail be my bed; 

The sheets shall ne'er be prest by me: 
Saint Anton's well sail be my drink, 

Since my true Love has forsaken me. 
Marti'mas wind, when wilt thou blaw 

And shake the green leaves aff the tree? 

gentle Death, when wilt thou come? 
For of my life I am wearie. 

*Tis not the frost, that freezes fell, 

Nor blawing snaw's inclemencie; 
'Tis not sic cauld that makes me cry. 

But my Love's heart grown cauld to me. 
When we came in by Glasgow town 

We were a comely sight to see; 
My Love was clad in the black velvet, 

And I my sell in cramasie. 

But had I wist, before I kist, 

That love had been sae ill to win; 

1 had lockt my heart in a case of gowd 
And pinn'd it with a siller pin. 



168 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

And, O ! if my young babe were born, 
And set upon the nurse's knee, 

And I mysell were dead and gane. 
And the green grass growing over me ! 

Anon. 

CXXXIV 

Upon my lap my sovereign sits 

And sucks upon my breast; 

Meantime his love maintains my life 

And gives my sense her rest. 
Sing lullaby, my little boy, 
Sing lullaby, mine only joy! 

When thou hast taken thy repast, 

Repose, my babe, on me; 

So may thy mother and thy nurse 

Thy cradle also be. 

Sing lullaby, my little boy, 
Sing lullaby, mine only joy! 

I grieve that duty doth not work 

All that my wishing would. 

Because I would not be to thee 

But in the best I should. 

Sing lullaby, my little boy, 
Sing lullaby, mine only joy! 

Yet as I am, and as I may, 
I must and will b(^ thine, 
Though all too little for thy self 



BOOK SECOND 169 

Vouchsafing to be mine. 

Sing lullaby, my little boy, 
Sing lullaby, mine only joy! 
Anon. 

cxxxv 

FAIR HELEN 

I WISH I were where Helen lies; 

Night and day on me she cries; 

O that I were where Helen Ues 

On fair Kirconnell lea! 

Curst be the heart that thought the thought, 
And curst the hand that fired the shot, 
When in my arms burd Helen dropt, 
And died to succour me! 

think na but my heart was sair 

When my Love dropt down and spak nae mair! 

1 laid her down wi' meikle care 

On fair Kirconnell lea. 

As I went down the water-side, 
None but my foe to be my guide. 
None but my foe to be my guide, 
On fair Kirconnell lea; 

I lighted down my sword to draw, 
I hacked him in pieces sma', 
I hacked him in pieces sma'. 

For her sake that died for me. 



170 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

O Helen fair, beyond compare! 
I'll make a garland of thy hair 
Shall bind my heart for evermair 
Until the day I die. 

O that I were where Helen lies! 
Night and day on me she cries; 
Out of my bed she bids me rise, 
Says, 'Haste and come to me!' 

Helen fair! O Helen chaste! 
If I were with thee, I were blest. 
Where thou lies low and takes thy rest 

On fair Kirconnell lea. 

1 wish my grave were growing green, 
A winding-sheet drawn ower my een, 
And I in Helen's arms lying, 

On fair Kirconnell lea. 

I wish I were where Helen lies; 
Night and day on me she cries; 
And I am weary of the skies. 
Since my Love died for me. 

Anon. 



CXXXVI 

THE TWA CORBIES 

As I was walking all alane 

I heard twa corbies making a mane; 



BOOK SECOND 171 

The tane unto the t'other say, 
'Where sail we gang and dine today?' 

' — In behint yon auld fail dyke, 
I wot there lies a new-slain Knight; 
And naebody kens that he lies there. 
But his hawk, his hound, and lady fair. 

' His hound is to the hunting gane. 
His hawk to fetch the wild-fowl hame, 
His lady's ta'en another mate. 
So we may mak our dinner sweet. 

' Ye'U sit on his white hause-bane, 
And I'll pick out his bonnie blue een: 
Wi' ae lock o' his gowden hair 
We'll theek our nest when it grows bare. 

*Mony a one for him makes mane. 
But nane sail ken where he is gane; 
O'er his white banes, when they are bare, 
The wind sail blaw for evermair.' 

Anon. 

CXXXVII 

ON THE DEATH OF MR. WILLIAM 
HERVEY 

It was a dismal and a fearful night, — 
Scarce could the Morn drive on th' unwilling light, 
When sleep, death's image, left my troubled breast, 
By something liker death possest. 



172 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

My eyes with tears did uncommanded flow, 
And on my soul hung the dull weight 
Of some intolerable fate. 

What bell was that? Ah me! Too much I know! 

My sweet companion, and my gentle peer, 
Why hast thou left me thus unkindly here. 
Thy end for ever, and my life, to moan? 

O thou hast left me all alone! 
Thy soul and body, when death's agony 
Besieged around thy noble heart. 
Did not with more reluctance part 
Than I, my dearest friend, do part from thee. 

Ye fields of Cambridge, our dear Cambridge, say, 

Have ye not seen us, walking every day? 

Was there a tree about which did not know 
The love betwixt us two? 

Henceforth, ye gentle trees, for ever fade. 
Or your sad branches thicker join, 
And into darksome shades combine, 

Dark as the grave wherein my friend is laid. 

Large was his soul; as large a soul as e'er 

Submitted to inform a body here; 

High as the place 'twas shortly in Heaven to have, 

But low and humble as his grave; 
So high that all the virtues there did come 

As to the chiefest seat 

Conspicuous, and great; 
go low that for me too it made a room. 



BOOK SECOND 173 

Knowledge he only sought, and so soon caught, 
As if for him knowledge had rather sought; 
Nor did more learning ever crowded lie 

In such a short mortality. 
Whene'er the skilful youth discoursed or writ, 

Still did the notions throng 

About his eloquent tongue; 
Nor could his ink flow faster than his wit. 

His mirth was the pure spirits of various wit, 

Yet never did his God or friends forget. 

And when deep talk and wisdom came in view, 
Retired, and gave to them their due. 

For the rich help of books he always took, 

Though his own searching mind before 
Was so with notions written o'er, 

As if wise Nature had made that her book. 

With as much zeal, devotion, piety. 

He always lived, as other saints do die. 

Still with his soul severe account he kept. 
Weeping all debts out ere he slept. 

Then down in peace and innocence he lay 
Like the sun's laborious light, 
Which still in water sets at night, 

Unsullied with his journey of the day. 

A. Cowley 



174 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

CXXXVIII 

FRIENDS IN PARADISE 

They are all gone into the world of light! 

And I alone sit lingering here; 
Their very memory is fair and bright, 

And my sad thoughts doth clear : — 

It glows and glitters in my cloudy breast, 
Like stars upon some gloomy grove, 
Or those faint beams in which this hill is drest, 
After the sun's remove. 

I see them walking in an air of glory. 

Whose light doth trample on my days: 

My days, which are at best but dull and hoary. 

Mere glimmering and decays. 

holy Hope ! and high Humility, 

High as the heavens above! 
These are your walks, and you have shew'd them me. 
To kindle my cold love. 

Dear, beauteous Death! the jewel of the just. 

Shining no where, but in the dark; 
What mysteries do lie beyond thy dust, 
Could man outlook that mark! 

He that hath found some fledged bird's nest, may know 

At first sight, if the bird be flown; 

But what fair well or grove he sings in now, 

That is to him unknown. 



BOOK SECOND 175 

And yet, as Angels in some brighter dreams 
Call to the soul, when man doth sleep; 
So some strange thoughts transcend our wonted themes, 
And into glory peep. 

H. Vaughan 

CXXXIX 
TO BLOSSOMS 

Fair pledges of a fruitful tree, 

Why do ye fall so fast? 

Your date is not so past. 
But you may stay yet here awhile 

To blush and gently smile, 
And go at last. 

What, were ye born to be 

An hour or half's delight. 

And so to bid good-night? 
'Twas pity Nature brought ye forth 

Merely to show your worth. 
And lose you quite. 

But you are lovely leaves, where we 
May read how soon things have 
Their end, though ne'er so brave: 
And after they have shown their pride 
Like you, awhile, they glide 
Into the grave. 

R. Herrick 



176 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

CXL 
TO DAFFODILS 

Fair Daffodils, we weep to see 

You haste away so soon : 
As yet the early-rising Sun 

Has not attained his noon. 
Stay, stay, 

Until the hasting day 
Has run 

But to the even-song; 
And, having pray'd together, we 

Will go with you along. 

We have short time to stay, as you, 

We have as short a Spring; 
As quick a growth to meet decay 
As you, or any thing. 

We die. 
As your hours do, and dry 

Away 
Like to the Summer's rain; 
Or as the pearls of morning's dew 
Ne'er to be found again. 

R. Herrick 

CXLI 

THE GIRL DESCRIBES HER FAWN 

With sweetest milk and sugar first 
I it at my own fingers nursed; 



BOOK SECOND 177 

And as it grew, so every day 

It wax'd more white and sweet than they — 

It had so sweet a breath ! and oft 

I blush'd to see its foot more soft 

And white, — shall I say, — than my hand? 

Nay, any lady's of the land! 

It is a wondrous thing how fleet 
'Twas on those little silver feet: 
With what a pretty skipping grace 
It oft would challenge me the race: — 
And when 't had left me far away 
'Twould stay, and run again, and stay: 
For it was nimbler much than hinds, 
And trod as if on the four winds. 

I have a garden of my own, 

But so with roses overgrown 

And lilies, that you would it guess 

To be a little wilderness : 

And all the spring-time of the year 

It only loved to be there. 

Among the beds of lilies I 

Have sought it oft, where it should lie; 

Yet could not, till itself would rise, 

Find it, although before mine eyes: — 

For in the flaxen lilies' shade 

It like a bank of lihes laid. 

Upon the roses it would feed. 

Until its lips e'en seem'd to bleed: 

And then to me 'twould boldly trip, 



178 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

And print those roses on my lip. 
But all its chief delight was still 
On roses thus itself to fill, 
And its pure virgin lim])S to fold 
In whitest sheets of lilies cold: — 
Had it lived long, it would have been 
Lilies without — roses within. 

A. Marvell 



CXLII 

THOUGHTS IN A GARDEN 

How vainly men themselves amaze 
To win the palm, the oak, or bays, 
And their uncessant labours see 
Crown'd from some single herb or tree, 
Whose short and narrow -verged shade 
Does prudently their toils upbraid; 
While all the flowers and trees do close 
To weave the garlands of Repose. 

Fair Quiet, have I found thee here, 
And Innocence thy sister dear! 
Mistaken long, I sought you then 
In busy companies of men: 
Your sacred plants, if here below, 
Only among the plants will grow: 
Society is all but rude 
To this delicious solitude. 
No white nor red was ever seen 



BOOK SECOND 179 

So amorous as this lovely green. 

Fond lovers, cruel as their flame, 

Cut in these trees their mistress' name: 

Little, alas, they know or heed 

How far these beauties hers exceed! 

Fair trees! wheres'e'er your barks I wound 

No name shall but your own be found. 

When we have run our passions' heat 
Love hither makes his best retreat: 
The gods, who mortal beauty chase, 
Still in a tree did end their race; 
Apollo hunted Daphne so 
Only that she might laurel grow; 
And Pan did after Syrinx speed 
Not as a nymph, but for a reed. 

What wondrous life is this I lead! 
Ripe apples drop about my head; 
The luscious clusters of the vine 
Upon my mouth do crush their wine; 
The nectarine and curious peach 
Into my hands themselves do reach; 
Stumbling on melons, as I pass. 
Ensnared with flowers, I fall on grass. 

Meanwhile the mind from pleasure less 
Withdraws into its happiness; 
The mind, that ocean where each kind 
Does straight its own resemblance find; 
Yet it creates, transcending these, 



180 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Far other worlds, and other seas; 

Annihilating all that's made 

To a green thought in a green shade. 

Here at the fountain's sliding foot 
Or at some fruit-tree's mossy root, 
Casting the body's vest aside 
My soul into the boughs does glide; 
There, like a bird, it sits and sings, 
Then whets and claps its silver wings, 
And, till prepared for longer flight. 
Waves in its plumes the various light. 

Such was that happy Garden-state 
While man there walk'd without a mate*. 
After a place so pure and sweet. 
What other help could yet be meet! 
But 'twas beyond a mortal's share 
To wander solitary there: 
Two paradises 'twere in one, 
To live in Paradise alone. 

How well the skilful gardener drew 
Of flowers and herbs this dial new! 
Where, from above, the milder sun 
Does through a fragrant zodiac run: 
And, as it works, th' industrious bee 
Computes its time as well as we. 
How could such sweet and wholesome hours 
Be reckon'd, but with herbs and flowers! 

A. Marvell 



BOOK SECOND 181 

CXLIII 

FORTUNATI NIMIUM 

Jack and Joan, they think no ill, 

But loving live, and merry still; 

Do their week-day's work, and pray 

Devoutly on the holy-day: 

Skip and trip it on the green, 

And help to choose the Summer Queen; 

Lash out at a country feast 

Their silver penny with the best. 

Well can they judge of nappy ale, 

And tell at large a winter tale; 

Climb up to the apple loft. 

And turn the crabs till they be soft. 

Tib is all the father's joy. 

And little Tom the mother's boy : — 

All their pleasure is, Content, 

And care, to pay their yearly rent. 

Joan can call by name her cows 
And deck her windows with green boughs; 
She can wreaths and tutties make. 
And trim with plums a bridal cake. 
Jack knows what brings gain or loss. 
And his long flail can stoutly toss : 
Makes the hedge which others break. 
And ever thinks what he doth speak. 

'- Now, you courtly dames and knights, 
That study only strange delights, 



182 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Though you scorn the homespun gray, 
And revel in your rich array; 
Though your tongues dissemble deep 
And can your heads from danger keep; 
Yet, for all your pomp and train, 
Securer lives the silly swain ! 

T. Campion 

CXLIV 
L'ALLEGRO 

Hence, loathed Melancholy, 

Of Cerberus and blackest Midnight born 
In Stj^gian cave forlorn 

'Mongst horrid shapes, and shrieks, and sights un- 
holy! 
Find out some uncouth cell 

Where brooding Darkness spreads his jealous wings 
And the night-raven sings; 

There under ebon shades, and low-brow'd rocks 
As ragged as thy locks. 

In dark Cimmerian desert ever dwell. 

But come, thou Goddess fair and free. 
In heaven yclept Euphrosyne, 
And by men, heart-easing Mirth, 
Whom lovely Venus at a birth 
With two sister Graces more 
To ivy-crowned Bacchus bore; 
Or whether (as some sager sing) 
The frolic wind that breathes the spring 



BOOK SECOND 183 

Zephyr, with Aurora playing, 
As he met her once a-Maying — 
There on beds of violets blue 
And fresh-blown roses wash'd in dew 
FJli'd her with thee, a daughter fair, 
So buxom, bhthe, and debonair. 

Haste thee, Nymph, and bring with thee 
Jest, and youthful jollity. 
Quips, and cranks, and wanton wiles, 
Nods, and becks, and wreathed smiles 
Such as hang on Hebe's cheek. 
And love to live in dimple sleek; 
Sport that wrinkled Care derides. 
And Laughter holding both his sides: — 
Come, and trip it as you go 
On the light fantastic toe; 
And in thy right hand lead with thee 
The mountain-nymph, sweet Liberty; 
And if I give thee honour due 
Mirth, admit me of thy crew, 
To live with her, and live with thee 
In unreproved pleasures free; 
To hear the lark begin his flight 
And singing startle the dull night 
From his watch-tower in the skies. 
Till the dappled dawn doth rise; 
Then to come, in spite of sorrow, 
And at my window bid good-morrow 
Through the sweetbriar, or the vine, 
Or the twisted eglantine: 
While the cock with lively din 



184 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Scatters the rear of darkness thin, 



And to the stack, or the barn-door, 
Stoutly struts his dames before: 
Oft Hstening how the hounds and horn 
Cheerly rouse the slumbering morn. 
From the side of some hoar hill. 
Through the high wood echoing shrill: 
Sometime walking, not unseen, 
By hedge-row elms, on hillocks green, 
Right against the eastern gate 
Where the great Sun begins his state 
Robed in flames and amber light. 
The clouds in thousand liveries dight; 
While the ploughman, near at hand, 
Whistles o'er the furrow'd land. 
And the milkmaid singeth blithe, 
And the mower whets his scythe, 
And every shepherd tells his tale 
Under the hawthorn in the dale. 

Straight mine eye hath caught new pleasures 
Whilst the landscape round it measures; 
Russet lawns, and fallows gray. 
Where the nibbling flocks do stray; 
Mountains, on whose barren breast 
The labouring clouds do often rest; 
Meadows trim with daisies pied, 
Shallow brooks, and rivers wide; 
Towers and battlements it sees 
Bosom'd high in tufted trees, 
Where perhaps some Beauty lies, 
The Cynosure of neighbouring eyes. 



BOOK SECOND 185 

Hard by, a cottage chimney smokes 
Ffom betwixt two aged oaks, 
Where Corydon and Thyrsis, met, 
Are at their savoury dinner set 
Of herbs, and other country messes 
Which the neat-handed Philhs dresses; 
And then in haste her bower she leaves 
With ThestyHs to bind the sheaves; 
Or, if the earlier season lead. 
To the tann'd haycock in the mead. 

Sometimes with secure delight 
The upland hamlets will invite. 
When the merry bells ring round, 
And the jocund rebecks sound 
To many a youth and many a maid, 
Dancing in the chequer'd shade; 
And young and old come forth to play 
On a sun-shine holyday. 
Till the live-long day-light fail: 
Then to the spicy nut-brown ale, 
With stories told of many a feat, 
How Faery Mab the junkets eat: — 
She was pinch'd, and pull'd, she said; 
And he, by Friar's lantern led; 
Tells how the drudging Goblin sweat 
To earn his cream-bowl duly set. 
When in one night, ere glimpse of morn, 
His shadowy flail hath thresh'd the corn 
That ten day-labourers could not end; 
Then lies him down the lubber fiend, 
And, stretch'd out all the chimney's length, 



186 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Basks at the fire his hairy strength; 
And crop-full out of doors he flings, 
Ere the first cock his matin rings. 

Thus done the tales, to bed they creep, 
By whispering winds soon luU'd asleep. 

Tower'd cities please us then 
And the busy hum of men, 
Where throngs of knights and barons bold, 
In weeds of peace, high triumphs hold. 
With store of ladies, whose bright eyes 
Rain influence, and judge the prize 
Of wit or arms, while both contend 
To win her grace, whom all commend. 
There let Hymen oft appear 
In saffron robe, with taper clear. 
And pomp, and feast, and revelry. 
With mask, and antique pageantry; 
Such sights as youthful poets dream 
On summer eves by haunted stream. 
Then to the well-trod stage anon. 
If Jonson's learned sock be on. 
Or sweetest Shakespeare, Fancy's child, 
Warble his native wood-notes wild. 

And ever against eating cares 
Lap me in soft Lydian airs 
Married to immortal verse, 
Such as the meeting soul may pierce 
In notes, with many a winding bout 
Of linked sweetness long drawn out, 
With wanton heed and giddy cunning. 
The melting voice through mazes running, 



BOOK SECOND 187 

Untwisting all the chains that tie 
The hidden soul of harmony; 
That Orpheus' self may heave his head 
From golden slumber, on a bed 
Of heap'd Elysian flowers, and hear 
Such strains as would have won the ear 
Of Pluto, to have quite set free 
His half-regain'd Eurydice. 

These delights if thou canst give, 
Mirth, with thee I mean to live. 

/. Milton 

CXLV 
IL PENSEROSO 

Hence, vain deluding Joys, 

The brood of Folly without father bred! 
How little you bestead 

Or fill the fixed mind with all your toys! 
Dwell in some idle brain, 

And fancies fond with gaudy shapes possess 
As thick and numberless 

As the gay motes that people the sunbeams, 
Or likest hovering dreams. 

The fickle pensioners of Morpheus' train. 

But hail, thou goddess sage and holy, 
Hail, divinest Melancholy! 
Whose saintly visage is too bright 
To hit the sense of human sight, 
And therefore to our weaker view 



188 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

O'erlaid with black, staid Wisdom's hue; 

Black, but such as in esteem 

Prince Memnon's sister might beseem, 

Or that starr'd Ethiop queen that strove 

To set her beauty's praise above 

The sea-nymphs, and their powers offended; 

Yet thou art higher far descended : 

Thee bright-hair'd Vesta, long of yore, 

To solitary Saturn bore; 

His daughter she ; in Saturn's reign 

Such mixture was not held a stain: 

Oft in glimmering bowers and glades 

He met her, and in secret shades 

Of woody Ida's inmost grove. 

While yet there saw no fear of Jove. 

Come, pensive Nun, devout and pure, 
Sober, steadfast, and demure, 
All in a robe of darkest grain 
Flowing with majestic train. 
And sable stole of Cipres lawn 
Over thy decent shoulders drawn: 
Come, but keep thy wonted state, 
With even step, and musing gait. 
And looks commercing with the skies, 
Thy rapt soul sitting in thine eyes: 
There, held in holy passion still, 
Forget thyself to marble, till 
With a sad leaden downward cast 
Thou fix them on the earth as fast: 
And join with thee calm Peace, and Quiet, 
Spare Fast, that oft with gods doth diet. 



BOOK SECOND 189 

And hears the Muses in a ring 
Aye round about Jove's altar sing: 
And add to these retired Leisure 
That in trim gardens takes his pleasure : — 
But first and chiefest, with thee bring 
Him that yon soars on golden wing 
Guiding the fiery-wheeled throne, 
The cherub Contemplation; 
And the mute Silence hist along, 
'Less Philomel will deign a song 
In her sweetest saddest plight 
Smoothing the rugged brow of Night, 
While Cynthia checks her dragon yoke 
Gently o'er the accustom'd oak. 
— Sweet bird, that shunn'st the noise of folly, 
Most musical, most melancholy! 
Thee, chauntress, oft, the woods among 
I woo, to hear thy even-song; 
And missing thee, I walk unseen 
On the dry smooth-shaven green, 
To behold the wandering Moon, 
Riding near her highest noon 
Like one that had been led astray 
Through the heaven's wide pathless way, 
And oft, as if her head she bow'd, 
Stooping through a fleecy cloud. 
Oft, on a plat of rising ground 
I hear the far-off Curfeu sound 
Over some wide-water'd shore, 
Swinging slow with sullen roar: 
Or^ if the airwillnot permit, 



190 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Some still removed place will fit, 

Where glowing embers through the room 

Teach light to counterfeit a gloom; 

Far from all resort of mirth, 

Save the cricket on the hearth, 

Or the bellman's drowsy charm 

To bless the doors from nightly harm. 

Or let my lamp at midnight hour 
Be seen in some high lonely tower, 
Where I may oft out-watch the Bear 
With thrice-great Hermes, or unsphere 
The spirit of Plato, to unfold 
What worlds or what vast regions hold 
The immortal mind, that hath forsook 
Her mansion in this fleshly nook: 
And of those demons that are found 
In fire, air, flood, or under ground, 
Whose power hath a true consent 
With planet, or with element. 
Sometime let gorgeous Tragedy 
In scepter'd pall come sweeping by, 
Presenting Thebes, or Pelops' line, 
Or the tale of Troy divine; 
Or what (though rare) of later age 
Ennobled hath the buskin'd stage. 

But, O sad Virgin, that thy power 
Might raise Musaeus from his bower, 
Or bid the soul of Orpheus sing 
Such notes as, warbled to the string, 
Drew iron tears down Pluto's cheek 
And made Hell grant what Love did seek! 



BOOK SECOND 191 

Or call up him that left half-told 
The story of Cambuscan bold, 
Of Camball, and of Algarsife, 
And who had Canace to wife 
That own'd the virtuous ring and glass; 
And of the wondrous horse of brass 
On which the Tartar king did ride: 
And if aught else great bards beside 
In sage and solemn tunes have sung 
Of turneys, and of trophies hung, 
Of forests, and enchantments drear. 
Where more is meant than meets the ear. 

Thus, Night, oft see me in thy pale career, 
Till civil-suited Morn appear. 
Not trick'd and frounced as she was wont 
With the Attic Boy to hunt. 
But kercheft in a comely cloud 
While rocking winds are piping loud, 
Or usher'd with a shower still, 
When the gust hath blown his fill. 
Ending on the rustling leaves 
With minute drops from off the eaves. 
And when the sun begins to fling 
His flaring beams, me, goddess, bring 
To arched walks of twilight groves, 
And shadows brown, that Sylvan loves. 
Of pine, or monumental oak. 
Where the rude axe, with heaved stroke. 
Was never heard the nymphs to daunt 
Or fright them from their hallow'd haunt. 
There in close covert by some brook 



192 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Where no profaner eye may look, 

Hide me from day's garish eye, 

While the bee with honey'd thigh 

That at her flowery work doth sing. 

And the waters murmuring, 

With such consort as they keep 

Entice the dewy-feather'd Sleep; 

And let some strange mysterious dream 

Wave at his wings in airy stream 

Of lively portraiture displayed, 

Softly on my eyelids laid : 

And, as I wake, sweet music breathe 

Above, about, or underneath. 

Sent by some Spirit to mortals good, 

Or the unseen Genius of the wood. 

But let my due feet never fail 
To walk the studious cloister's pale, 
And love the high-embowed roof. 
With antique pillars massy proof, 
And storied windows richly dight 
Casting a dim religious light. 
There let the pealing organ blow 
To the full-voiced quire below 
In service high and anthems clear, 
As may with sweetness, through mine ear, 
Dissolve me into ecstasies. 
And bring all Heaven before mine eyes. 

And may at last my weary age 
Find out the peaceful hermitage, 
The hairy gown and mossy cell 
Where I may sit and rightly spell 



BOOK SECOND 193 

Of every star that heaven doth shew, 
And every herb that sips the dew; 
Till old experience do attain 
To something like prophetic strain. 

These pleasures, Melancholy, give, 
And I with thee will choose to live. 

J. Milton 

CXLVI 

SONG OF THE EMIGRANTS IN BERMUDA 

Where the remote Bermudas ride 
In the ocean's bosom unespied, 
From a small boat that row'd along 
The listening winds received this song. 

'What should we do but sing His praise 
That led us through the watery maze 
Where He the huge sea-monsters wracks. 
That lift the deep upon their backs, 
Unto an isle so long unknown, 
And yet far kinder than our own? 
He lands us on a grassy stage, 
Safe from the storms, and prelate's rage: 
He gave us this eternal Spring 
Which here enamels everything, 
And sends the fowls to us in care 
On daily visits through the air. 
He hangs in shades the orange bright 
Like golden lamps in a green night, 
And does in the pomegranates close 
Jewels more rich than Ormus shows: 



194 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

He makes the figs our mouths to meet 
And throws the melons at our feet; 
But apples plants of such a price, 
No tree could ever bear them twice. 
With cedars chosen by His hand 
From Lebanon He stores the land; 
And makes the hollow seas that roar 
Proclaim the ambergris on shore. 
He cast (of which we rather boast) 
The Gospel's pearl upon our coast; 
And in these rocks for us did frame 
A temple where to sound His name. 
Oh! let our voice His praise exalt 
Till it arrive at Heaven's vault, 
Which thence (perhaps) rebounding may 
Echo beyond the Mexique bay ! ' 
— Thus sung they in the English boat 
A holy and a cheerful note: 
And all the way, to guide their chime, 
With falling oars they kept the time. 

A. Marvell 

CXLVII 

AT A SOLEMN MUSIC 

Blest pair of Sirens, pledges of Heaven's joy, 
Sphere-born harmonious Sisters, Voice and Verse! 
Wed your divine sounds, and mixt power employ, 
Dead things with inbreathed sense able to pierce; 
And to our high-raised phantasy present 
That undisturbed Song of pure concent 



BOOK SECOND 195 

Aye sung before the sapphire-colour'd throne 

To Him that sits thereon, 
With saintly shout and solemn jubilee; 
Where the bright Seraphim in burning row 
Their loud uplifted angel-trumpets blow; 
And the Cherubic host in thousand quires 
Touch their immortal harps of golden wires, 
With those just Spirits that wear victorious palms, 

Hymns devout and holy psalms 

Singing everlastingly: 
That we on Earth, with undiscording voice 
May rightly answer that melodious noise; 
As once we did, till disproportion'd sin 
Jarr'd against nature's chime, and with harsh din 
Broke the fair music that all creatures made 
To their great Lord, whose love their motion sway'd 
In perfect diapason, whilst they stood 
In first obedience, and their state of good. 
O may we soon again renew that Song, 
And keep in tune with Heaven, till God ere long 
To His celestial consort us unite. 
To live with Him, and sing in endless morn of light ! 

J. Milton 

CXLVIII 

NOX NOCTI INDICAT SCIENTIAM 

When I survey the bright 
Celestial sphere: 
So rich with jewels hung, that night 
Doth like an Ethiop bride appear; 



196 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

My soul her wings doth spread, 
And heaven-ward flies, 
The Almighty's mysteries to read 
In the large volumes of the skies. 

For the bright firmament 
Shoots forth no flame 
So silent, but is eloquent 
In speaking the Creator's name. 

No unregarded star 
Contracts its light 
Into so small a character, 
Removed far from our human sight, 

But if we steadfast look, 
We shall discern 
In it as in some holy book. 
How man may heavenly knowledge learn. 

It tells the Conqueror, 

That far-stretch'd power 
Which his proud dangers traffic for, 
Is but the triumph of an hour. 

That from the farthest North 
Some nation may 
Yet undiscover'd issue forth, 
And o'er his new-got conquest sway. 

Some nation yet shut in 
With hills of ice, 



BOOK SECOND 197 

May be let out to scourge his sin, 
Till they shall equal him in vice. 

And then they likewise shall 
Their ruin have; 
For as yourselves your Empires fall, 
And every Kingdom hath a grave. 

Thus those celestial fires, 
Though seeming mute. 
The fallacy of our desires 
And all the pride of life, confute. 

For they have watch'd since first 
The world had birth : 
And found sin in itself accursed, 
And nothing permanent on earth. 

W. Habington 



CXLIX 
HYMN TO DARKNESS 

Hail thou most sacred venerable thing! 

What Muse is worthy thee to sing? 
Thee, from whose pregnant universal womb 
All things, ev'n Light, thy rival, first did come. 
What dares he not attempt that sings of thee, 

Thou first and greatest mystery? 
Who can the secrets of thy essence tell? 
Thou, like the light of God, art inaccessible. 



198 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Before great Love this monument did raise 

This ample theatre of praise; 
Before the folding circles of the sky 
Were tuned by Him, Who is all harmony; 
Before the morning Stars their hymn began, 

Before the council held for man, 
Before the birth of either time or place. 
Thou reign'st unquestion'd monarch in the empty space. 

Thy native lot thou didst to Light resign. 

But still half of the globe is thine. 
Here with a quiet, but yet awful hand. 
Like the best emperors thou dost command. 
To thee the stars above their brightness owe, 

And mortals their repose below: 
To thy protection fear and sorrow flee. 
And those that weary are of light, find rest in thee. 

J. Norris of Bemerton 

CL 

A VISION 

I SAW Eternity the other night. 

Like a great ring of pure and endless light. 

All calm, as it was bright : — 
And round beneath it. Time, in hours, days, years, 

Driven by the spheres. 
Like a vast shadow moved; in which the World 

And all her train were hurl'd. 

H. Vaughan 



BOOK SECOND 199 



CLI 



ALEXANDER'S FEAST, OR, THE POWER 
OF MUSIC 

'TwAS at the royal feast for Persia won 
By Philip's warlike son — 
Aloft in awful state 
The godlike hero sate 
On his imperial throne; 
His valiant peers were placed around, 
Their brows with roses and with myrtles bound, 
(So should desert in arms be crown'd) ; 
, The lovely Thais by his side 

Sate like a blooming Eastern bride 

In flower of youth and beauty's pride: — 

Happy, happy, happy pair! 

None but the brave 

None but the brave 

None but the brave deserves the fair! 

Timotheus placed on high 
Amid the tuneful quire 
With flying fingers touch'd the lyre: 
The trembling notes ascend the sky 
And heavenly joys inspire. 
The song began from Jove 
Who left his blissful seats above — 
Such is the power of mighty love! 
A dragon's fiery form belied the god; 
Sublime on radiant sp)ires he rode 



200 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

When he to fair Olympia prest, 

And while he sought her snowy breast, 

Then round her slender waist he curl'd, 

And stamp 'd an image of himself, a sovereign of the 

world. 
— The listening crowd admire the lofty sound; 
A present deity! they shout around: 
A present deity! the vaulted roofs rebound: 
With ravish 'd ears 
The monarch hears, 
Assumes the god; 
Affects to nod 
And seems to shake the spheres. 

The praise of Bacchus then the sweet musician sung, 
Of Bacchus ever fair and ever young: 
The jolly god in triumph comes; 
Sound the trumpets, beat the drums! 
Flush'd with a purple grace 
He shows his honest face: 

Now give the hautboys breath; he comes, he comes! 
Bacchus, ever fair and young. 
Drinking joys did first ordain; 
Bacchus' blessings are a treasure, 
Drinking is the soldier's pleasure: 
Rich the treasure. 
Sweet the pleasure, 
Sweet is pleasure after pain. 

Soothed with the sound, the king grew vain; 
Fought all his battles o'er again, 



BOOK SECOND 201 

And thrice he routed all his foes, and thrice he slew 

the slain! 
The master saw the madness rise, 
His glowing cheeks, his ardent eyes; 
And while he Heaven and Earth defied 
Changed his hand and check'd his pride. 
He chose a mournful Muse 
Soft pity to infuse : 
He sung Darius great and good, 
By too severe a fate 
Fallen, fallen, fallen, fallen. 
Fallen from his high estate. 
And weltering in his blood; 
Deserted at his utmost need 
By those his former bounty fed; 
On the bare earth exposed he lies 
With not a friend to close his eyes. 
— With downcast looks the joyless victor sate, 
Revolving in his alter'd soul 
The various turns of Chance below; 
And now and then a sigh he stole, 
And tears began to flow. 

The mighty master smiled to see 
That love was in the next degree; 
'Twas but a kindred-sound to move, 
For pity melts the mind to love. 
Softly sweet, in Lydian measures 
Soon he soothed his soul to pleasures. 
War, he sung, is toil and trouble, 
Honour but an empty bubble; 



202 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Never ending, still beginning, 

Fighting still, and still destroying; 

If the world be worth thy winning. 

Think, O think, it worth enjoying: 

Lovely Thais sits beside thee. 

Take the good the gods provide thee! 

— The many rend the skies with loud applause ; 

So Love was crown'd, but Music won the cause. 

The prince, unable to conceal his pain, 

Gazed on the fair 

Who caused his care. 

And sigh'd and look'd, sigh'd and look'd, 

Sigh'd and look'd, and sigh'd again: 

At length with love and wine at once opprest 

The vanquished victor sunk upon her breast. 

Now strike the golden lyre again : 
A louder yet, and yet a louder strain! 
Break his bands of sleep asunder 
And rouse him like a rattling peal of thunder 
Hark, hark! the horrid sound 
Has raised up his head: 
As awaked from the dead 
And amazed he stares around. 
Revenge, revenge, Timotheus cries, 
See the Furies arise! 
See the snakes that they rear 
How they hiss in their hair. 
And the sparkles that flash from their eyes! 
Behold a ghastly band, 
Each a torch in his hand! 



BOOK SECOND 203 

Those are Grecian ghosts, that in battle were slain 

And unburied remain 

Inglorious on the plain: 

Give the vengeance due 

To the valiant crew! 

Behold how they toss their torches on high, 

How they point to the Persian abodes 

And glittering temples of their hostile gods. 

— The princes applaud with a furious joy: 

And the King seized a flambeau with zeal to destroy; 

Thais led the way 

To light him to his prey, 

And like another Helen, fired another Troy! 

— Thus, long ago. 
Ere heaving bellows learn'd to blow, 
While organs yet were mute, 
Timotheus, to his breathing flute 
And sounding lyre 

Could swell the soul to rage, or kindle soft desire. 
At last divine Cecilia came. 
Inventress of the vocal frame; 
The sweet enthusiast from her sacred store 
Enlarged the former narrow bounds, 
And added length to solemn sounds. 
With Nature's mother-wit, and arts unknown before. 

— Let old Timotheus yield the prize 
Or both divide the crown; 

He raised a mortal to the skies; 
She drew an angel down! 

J. Dryden 



BOOK THIRD 

CLII 

ODE ON THE PLEASURE ARISING FROM 
VICISSITUDE 

Now the golden Morn aloft 

Waves her dew-bespangled wing, 
With vermeil cheek and whisper soft 

She woos the tardy Spring: 
Till April starts, and calls around 
The sleeping fragrance from the ground, 
And lightly o'er the living scene 
Scatters his freshest, tenderest green. 

New-born flocks, in rustic dance, 

Frisking ply their feeble feet; 
Forgetful of their wintry trance 

The birds his presence greet: 
But chief, the sky-lark warbles high 
His trembling thrilling ecstasy; 
And lessening from the dazzled sight, 
Melts into air and liquid light. 
205 



206 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Yesterday the sullen year 

Saw the snowy whirlwind fly; 
Mute was the music of the air, 
The herd stood drooping by: 
Their raptures now that wildly flow 
No yesterday nor morrow know; 
'Tis Man alone that joy descries 
With forward and reverted eyes. 

Smiles on past misfortune's brow 
Soft reflection's hand can trace, 
And o'er the cheek of sorrow throw 

A melancholy grace; 
While hope prolongs our happier hour, 
Or deepest shades, that dimly lour 
And blacken round our weary way. 
Gilds with a gleam of distant day. 

Still, where rosy pleasure leads. 

See a kindred grief pursue; 
Behind the steps that misery treads 

Approaching comfort view: 
The hues of bliss more brightly glow 
Chastised by sabler tints of woe. 
And blended form, with artful strife. 
The strength and harmony of life. 

See the wretch that long has tost 
On the thorny bed of pain, 

At length repair his vigour lost 
And breathe and walk again: 



BOOK THIRD 207 

The meanest floweret of the vale, 
The simplest note that swells the gale, 
The common sun, the air, the skies, 
To him are opening Paradise. 

T. Gray 

CLIII 
ODE TO SIMPLICITY 

O Thou, by Nature taught 

To breathe her genuine thought 
In numbers warmly pure, and sweetly strong; 

Who first, on mountains wild, 

In Fancy, loveliest child. 
Thy babe, or Pleasure's, nursed the powers of song! 

Thou, who with hermit heart, 

Disdain'st the wealth of art. 
And gauds, and pageant weeds, and trailing pall, 

But com'st, a decent maid 

In Attic robe array'd, 
O chaste, unboastful Nymph, to thee I call! 

By all the honey'd store 

On Hybla's thymy shore. 
By all her blooms and mingled murmurs dear; 

By her whose love-lorn woe 

In evening musings slow 
Soothed sweetly sad Electra's poet's ear: 

By old Cephisus deep, 
Who spread his wavy sweep 



208 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

In warbled wanderings round thy green retreat; 

On whose enamell'd side, 

When holy Freedom died, 
No equal haunt allured thy future feet : — 

sister meek of Truth, 

To my admiring youth 
Thy sober aid and native charms infuse! 

The flowers that sweetest breathe, 

Though Beauty cull'd the wreath, 
Still ask thy hand to range their order'd hues. 

While Rome could none esteem 

But Virtue's patriot theme, 
You loved her hills, and led her laureat band; 

But stay'd to sing alone 

To one distinguish'd throne; 
And turn'd thy face, and fled her alter'd land. 

No more, in hall or bower. 

The Passions own thy power; 
Love, only Love, her forceless numbers mean: 

For thou hast left her shrine; 

Nor olive more, nor vine. 
Shall gain thy feet to bless the servile scene. 

Though taste, though genius, bless 

To some divine excess. 
Faints the cold work till thou inspire the whole; 

What each, what all supply 

May court, may charm our eye; 
Thou, only thou, canst raise the meeting soul! 



BOOK THIRD 209 

Of these let others ask 

To aid some mighty task; 
I only seek to find thy temperate vale; 

Where oft my reed might sound 

To maids and shepherds round, 
And all thy sons, O Nature! learn my tale. 

W. Collins 

CLIV 

SOLITUDE 

Happy the man, whose wish and care 
A few paternal acres bound, 
Content to breathe his native air 
In his own ground. 

Whose herds with milk, whose fields with bread. 
Whose flocks supply him with attire; 
Whose trees in summer yield him shade, 
In winter fire. 

Blest, who can unconcernedly find 
Hours, days, and years, slide soft away 
In health of body, peace of mind. 
Quiet by day, 

Sound sleep by night; study and ease 
Together mixt, sweet recreation. 
And innocence, which most does please 
With meditation. 

Thus let me live, unseen, unknown; 
Thus unlamented let me die; 



210 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Steal from the world, and not a stone 
Tell where I lie. 

A. Pope 

CLV 
THE BLIND BOY 

SAY what is that thing call'd Light, 
Which I must ne'er enjoy; 

What are the blessings of the sight, 
O tell your poor blind boy! 

You talk of wondrous things you see, 
You say the sun shines bright; 

1 feel him warm, but how can he 
Or make it day or night? 

My day or night myself I make 

Whene'er I sleep or play; 
And could I ever keep awake 

With me 'twere always day. 

With heavy sighs I often hear 
You mourn my hapless woe; 

But sure with patience I can bear 
A loss I ne'er can know. 

Then let not what I cannot have 

My cheer of mind destroy: 
Whilst thus I sing, I am a king, 

Although a poor blind boy. 

C. Cihher 



BOOK THIRD 211 



CLVI 



ON A FAVOURITE CAT, DROWNED IN A 
TUB OF GOLD FISHES 

^TwAS on a lofty vase's side, 
Where China's gayest art had dyed 
The azure flowers that blow, 
Demurest of the tabby Idnd 
The pensive Selima, reclined, 
Gazed on the lake below. 

Her conscious tail her joy declared: 
The fair round face, the snowy beard, 
The velvet of her paws, 
Her coat that with the tortoise vies, 
Her ears of jet, and emerald eyes — 
She saw, and purr'd applause. 

Still had she gazed, but 'midst the tide 
Two angel forms were seen to glide. 
The Genii of the stream: 
Their scaly armour's Tyrian hue 
Through richest purple, to the view 
Betray 'd a golden gleam. 

The hapless Nymph with wonder saw: 

A whisker first, and then a claw 

With many an ardent wish 

She stretch'd, in vain, to reach the prize — 

What female heart can gold despise? 

What Cat's averse to fish? 



212 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Presumptuous maid! with looks intent 
Again she stretch'd, again she bent, 
Nor knew the gulf between — 
Malignant Fate sat by and smiled — 
The slippery verge her feet beguiled; 
She tumbled headlong in! 

Eight times emerging from the flood 
She mew'd to every watery God 
Some speedy aid to send : — 
No Dolphin came, no Nereid stirr'd, 
Nor cruel Tom nor Susan heard — 
A favourite has no friend ! 

From hence, ye Beauties ! undeceived 
Know one false step is ne'er retrieved. 
And be with caution bold : 
Not all that tempts your wandering eyes 
And heedless hearts, is lawful prize, 
Nor all that glisters, gold! 

T, Gray 

CLVII 

TO CHARLOTTE PULTENEY 

Timely blossom, Infant fair. 
Fondling of a happy pair. 
Every morn and every night 
Their sohcitous delight. 
Sleeping, waking, still at ease. 
Pleasing, without skill to please; 



BOOK THIRD 213 

Little gossip, blithe and hale, 

Tattling many a broken tale, 

Singing many a tuneless song. 

Lavish of a heedless tongue; 

Simple maiden, void of art, 

Babbling out the very heart, 

Yet abandon'd to thy will, 

Yet imagining no ill, 

Yet too innocent to blush; 

Like the linnet in the bush 

To the mother-linnet's note 

Moduling her slender throat; 

Chirping forth thy petty joys. 

Wanton in the change of toys. 

Like the linnet green, in May 

Flitting to each bloomy spray; 

Wearied then and glad of rest, 

Like the linnet in the nest : — 

This thy present happy lot 

This, in time will be forgot: 

Other pleasures, other cares. 

Ever-busy Time prepares; 
And thou shalt in thy daughter see, 
This picture, once, resembled thee. 

A. Philips 

CLVIII 

RULE BRITANNIA 

When Britain first at Heaven's command 
Arose from out the azure main, 



214 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

This was the charter of her land, 
And guardian angels sung the strain: 
Rule, Britannia! Britannia rules the waves! 
Britons never shall be slaves. 

The nations not so blest as thee 
Must in their turn to tyrants fall. 

Whilst thou shalt flourish great and free 
The dread and envy of them all. 

Still more majestic shalt thou rise. 

More dreadful from each foreign stroke; 

As the loud blast that tears the skies 
Serves but to root thy native oak. 

Thee haughty tyrants ne'er shall tame; 

All their attempts to bend thee down 
Will but arouse thy generous flame. 

And work their woe and thy renown. 

To thee belongs the rural reign; 

Thy cities shall with commerce shine; 
All thine shall be the subject main, 

And every shore it circles thine! 

The Muses, still with Freedom found, 

Shall to thy happy coast repair; 
Blest Isle, with matchless beauty crown'd 
And manly hearts to guard the fair : — 
Rule, Britannia ! Britannia rules the waves ! 
Britons never shall be slaves ! 

J. Thomson 



BOOK THIRD 215 

CLIX 
THE BARD 

Pindaric Ode 

'Ruin seize thee, ruthless King! 

Confusion on thy banners wait; 
Tho' fann'd by Conquest's crimson wing 

They mock the air with idle state. 
Helm, nor hauberk's twisted mail, 
Nor e'en thy virtues. Tyrant, shall avail 
To save thy secret soul from nightly fears. 
From Cambria's curse, from Cambria's tears!' 
— Such were the sounds that o'er the crested pride 

Of the first Edward scatter'd wild dismay. 
As down the steep of Snowdon's shaggy side 

He wound with toilsome march his long array : — 
Stout Glo'ster stood aghast in speechless trance; 
' To arms ! ' cried Mortimer, and couch'd his quivering 
lance. 

On a rock, whose haughty brow 
Frowns o'er old Conway's foaming flood, 

Robed in the sable garb of woe 
With haggard eyes the Poet stood; 
(Loose his beard and hoary hair 
Stream'd like a meteor to the troubled air) 
And with a master's hand and prophet's fire 
Struck the deep sorrows of his lyre : 

' Hark, how each giant-oak and desert-cave 
Sighs to the torrent's awful voice beneath! 



216 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

O'er thee, oh King! their hundred arms they wave, 

Revenge on thee in hgarser murmurs breathe; 
Vocal no more, since Cambria's fatal day, 
To high-born Hoel's harp, or soft Llewellyn's lay. 

' Cold is Cadwallo's tongue. 

That hush'd the stormy main: 
Brave Urien sleeps upon his craggy bed: 

Mountains, ye mourn in vain 

Modred, whose magic song 
Made huge Plinlirnmon bow his cloud-topt head. 

On dreary Arvon's shore they lie 
Smear'd with gore and ghastly pale : 
Far, far aloof the affrighted ravens sail; 

The famish'd eagle screams, and passes by. 
Dear lost companions of my tuneful art, 

Dear as the light that visits these sad eyes. 
Dear as the ruddy drops that warm my heart, 

Ye died amidst your dying country's cries — 
No more I weep; They do not sleep; 

On yonder cliffs, a griesly band, 
I see them sit; They linger yet, 

Avengers of their native land: 
With me in dreadful harmony they join. 
And weave with bloody hands the tissue of thy line. 

' Weave the warp and weave the woof 
The winding sheet of Edward's race : 

Give ample room and verge enough 
The characters of hell to trace. 
Mark the year, and mark the night, 



BOOK THIRD 217 

When Severn shall re-echo with affright 

The shrieks of death thro' Berkley's roof that vinQf 

Shrieks of an agonizing king I 

She-wolf of France, with unrelenting fangs 
That tear'st the bowels of thy mangled mate, 

From thee he horn, who o'er thy country hangs 
The scourge of heaven I What terrors round him wait ! 
Amazement in his van, with flight combined, 
Arid sorrow's faded form, and solitude behind. 

' Mighty victor, mighty lord, 

Low on his funeral couch he lies! 
No pitying heart, no eye, afford 

A tear to grace his obsequies. 
Is the sable warrior fled ? 
Thy son is gone. He rests among the dead. 
The swarm that in thy noon-tide beam were born f 
— Gone to salute the rising morn. 
Fair laughs the Morn, and soft the zephyr blows. 

While proudly riding o'er the azure realm 
In gallant trim the gilded vessel goes : 

Youth on the prow, and Pleasure at the helm : 
Regardless of the sweeping whirlwind's sway, 
That hush'd in grim repose expects his evening prey. 

^Fill high the sparkling bowl. 
The rich repast prepare ; 

Reft of a crown, he yet may share the feast : 
Close by the regal chair 

Fell Thirst and Famine scowl 

A baleful smile upon their baffled guest, 



218 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Heard ye the din of battle bray, 

Lance to lance, and horse to horse f 

Long years of havock urge their destined course, 
And thro' the kindred squadrons mow their way. 

Ye towers of Julius, London's lasting shame. 
With many a foul and inidnight murder fed. 

Revere his consort's faith, his father's fame. 
And spare the meek usurper's holy head! 
Above, below, the rose of snow. 

Twined with her blushing foe, we spread : 
The bristled boar in infant-gore 

Wallows beneath the thorny shade. 
Now, brothers, bending o'er the accursed loom, 
Stamp we our vengeance deep, and ratify his doom. 

' Edward, lo ! to sudden fate 

{Weave we the woof; The thread is spun;) 
Half of thy heart we consecrate. 

{The web is wove; The work is done.) 
— Stay, oh stay! nor thus forlorn 
Leave me unbless'd, unpitied, here to mourn: 
In yon bright track that fires the western skies 
They melt, they vanish from my eyes. 
But oh ! what solemn scenes on Snowdon's height 

Descending slow their glittering skirts unroll? 
Visions of glory, spare my aching sight. 
Ye unborn ages, crowd not on my soul ! 
No more our long-lost Arthur we bewail : — 
All hail, ye genuine kings! Britannia's issue, hail! 

' Girt with many a baron bold 
Sublime their starry fronts they rear; 



BOOK THIRD 219 

And gorgeous dames, and statesmen old 
In bearded majesty, appear. 
In the midst a form divine! 
Her eye proclaims her of the Briton-line: 
Her lion-port, her awe-commanding face 
Attemper'd sweet to virgin-grace. 
What strings symphonious tremble in the air, 

.What strains of vocal transport round her play? 
Hear from the grave, great Taliessin, hear; 

They breathe a soul to animate thy clay. 
Bright Rapture calls, and soaring as she sings. 
Waves in the eye of heaven her many-colour'd wings. 

'The verse adorn again 

Fierce war, and faithful love. 
And truth severe, by fairy fiction drest. 

In buskin'd measures move 
Pale grief, and pleasing pain, 
With horror, tyrant of the throbbing breast. 
A voice as of the cherub-choir 

Gales from blooming Eden bear, 

And distant warblings lessen on my ear 
That lost in long futurity expire. 
Fond impious man, think'st thou yon sanguine cloud 

Raised by thy breath, has quench'd the orb of day? 
To-morrow he repairs the golden flood 

And warms the nations with redoubled ray. 
Enough for me: with joy I see 

The different doom our fates assign: 
Be thine despair and sceptred care. 

To triumph and to die are mine.' 



220 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

— He spoke, and headlong from the mountain's height 
Deep in the roaring tide he plunged to endless night. 

T. Gray 

CLX 

ODE WRITTEN IN 1746 

How sleep the brave, who sink to rest 
By all their country's wishes blest! 
When Spring, with dewy fingers cold, 
Returns to deck their hallow'd mould, 
She there shall dress a sweeter sod 
Than Fancy's feet have ever trod. 

By fairy hands their knell is rung, 
By forms unseen their dirge is sung: 
There Honour comes, a pilgrim gray, 
To bless the turf that wraps their clay; 
And Freedom shall awhile repair 
To dwell a weeping hermit there! 

W. Collins 

CLXI 

LAMENT FOR CULLODEN 

The lovely lass o' Inverness, 
Nae joy nor pleasure can she see; 
For e'en and morn she cries, Alas! 
And aye the saut tear blins her ee: 
Drumossie moor — Drumossie day — 
A waefu' day it was to me! 



BOOK THIRD 221 

For there I lost my father dear, 
My father dear, and brethren three. 

Their winding-sheet the bluidy clay, 
Their graves are growing green to see: 
And by them lies the dearest lad 
That ever blest a woman's ee! 
Now wae to thee, thou cruel lord, 
A bluidy man I trow thou be; 
For mony a heart thou hast made sair 
That ne'er did wrang to thine or thee. 

R. Burns 

CLXII 
LAMENT FOR FLODDEN 

IVe heard them lilting at our ewe-milking. 

Lasses a' lilting before dawn o' day; 
But now they are moaning on ilka green loaning — 

The Flowers of the Forest are a' wede away. 

At bughts, in the morning, nae blythe lads are 
scorning, 

Lasses are lonely and dowie and wae; 
Nae daffin', nae gabbin', but sighing and sabbing. 

Ilk ane lifts her leglin and hies her away. 

In har'st, at the shearing, nae youths now are jeering, 
Bandsters are lyart, and runkled, and gray; 

At fair or at preaching, nae wooing, nae fleeching — • 
The Flowers of the Forest are a' wede away. 



222 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

At e'en, in the gloaming, nae younkers are roaming 
'Bout stacks wi' the lasses at bogle to play; 

But ilk ane sits drearie, lamenting her dearie — 
The Flowers of the Forest are weded away. 

Dool and wae for the order, sent our lads to the 
Border ! 
The English, for ance, by guile wan the day; 
The Flowers of the Forest, that fought aye the 
foremost, 
The prime of our land, are cauld in the clay. 

We'll hear nae mair lilting at the ewe-milking; 

Women and bairns are heartless and wae; 
Sighing and moaning on ilka green loaning — 

The Flowers of the Forest are a' wede away. 

J. Elliott 

CLXIII 

THE BRAES OF YARROW 

Thy braes were bonny, Yarrow stream, 
When first on them I met my lover; 
Thy braes how dreary. Yarrow stream, 
When now thy waves his body cover! 
For ever now, O Yarrow stream! 
Thou art to me a stream of sorrow; 
For never on thy banks shall I 
Behold my Love, the flower of Yarrow! 

He promised me a milk-white steed 
To bear me to his father's bowers; 



BOOK THIRD 223 

He promised me a little page 

To squire me to his father's towers; 

He promised me a wedding-ring, — 

The wedding-day was fix'd to-morrow; — 

Now he is wedded to his grave, 

Alas, his watery grave, in Yarrow! 

Sweet were his words when last we met; 
My passion I as freely told him; 
Clasp 'd in his arms, I little thought 
That I should never more behold him! 
Scarce was he gone, I saw his ghost; 
It vanish'd with a shriek of sorrow; 
Thrice did the water-wraith ascend, 
And gave a doleful groan thro' Yarrow. 

His mother from the window look'd 

With all the longing of a mother; 

His little sister weeping walk'd 

The green-wood path to meet her brother; 

They sought him east, they sought him west, 

They sought him all the forest thorough; 

They only saw the cloud of night. 

They only heard the roar of Yarrow. 

No longer from thy window look — 
Thou hast no son, thou tender mother! 
No longer walk, thou lovely maid; 
Alas, thou hast no more a brother! 
No longer seek him east or west 
And search no more the forest thorough; 



224 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

For, wandering in the night so dark, 
He fell a lifeless corpse in Yarrow. 

The tear shall never leave my cheek, 
No other youth shall be my marrow — 
I'll seek thy body in the stream, 
And then with thee I'll sleep in Yarrow. 
— The tear did never leave her cheek. 
No other youth became her marrow; 
She found his body in the stream, 
And now with him she sleeps in Yarrow. 

J, Logan 



CLXIV 
WILLY DROWNED IN YARROW 

Down in yon garden sweet and gay 
Where bonnie grows the lily, 

I heard a fair maid sighing say, 
^My wish be wi' sweet Willie I 

'Willie's rare, and Willie's fair, 
And Willie's wondrous bonny; 

And Willie hecht to marry me 
Gin e'er he married ony. 

*0 gentle wind, that bloweth south 
From where my Love repaireth. 

Convey a kiss frae his dear mouth 
And tell me how he fareth! 



BOOK THIRD 225 

^0 tell sweet Willie to come doun 

And hear the mavis singing, 
And see the birds on ilka bush 

And leaves around them hinging. 

* The lav'rock there, wi' her white breast 

And gentle throat sae narrow; 
There's sport eneuch for gentlemen 

On Leader haughs and Yarrow. 

^0 Leader haughs are wide and braid 

And Yarrow haughs are bonny; 
There Willie hecht to marry me 

If e'er he married ony. 

*But Willie's gone, whom I thought on, 

And does not hear me weeping; 
Draws many a tear frae true love's e'e 

When other maids are sleeping. 

'Yestreen I made my bed fu' braid, 

The night I'll mak' it narrow, 
For a' the live-lang winter night 

I lie twined o' my marrow. 

*0 came ye by yon water-side? 

Pou'd you the rose or lily? 
Or came you by yon meadow green, 

Or saw you my sweet Willie? ' 

She sought him up, she sought him down. 
She sought him braid and narrow; 



226 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Syne, in the cleaving of a craig, 
She found him drown'd in Yarrow! 

Anon, 

CLXV 

LOSS OF THE ROYAL GEORGE 

Toll for the Brave! 
The brave that are no more! 
All sunk beneath the wave 
Fast by their native shore! 

Eight hundred of the brave 
Whose courage well was tried, 
Had made the vessel heel 
And laid her on her side. 

A land-breeze shook the shrouds 
And she was overset; 
Down went the Royal George, 
With all her crew complete. 

Toll for the brave! 
Brave Kempenfelt is gone; 
His last sea-fight is fought, 
His work of glory done. 

It was not in the battle; 
No tempest gave the shock; 
She sprang no fatal leak. 
She ran upon no rock. 



BOOK THIRD 227 

His sword was in its sheath, 
His fingers held the pen, 
When Kempenfelt went down 
With twice four hundred men. 

— Weigh the vessel up 
Once dreaded by our foes! 
And mingle with our cup 
The tears that England owes. 

Her timbers yet are sound. 

And she may float again 

Full charged with England's thunder, 

And plough the distant main: 

But Kempenfelt is gone, 
His victories are o'er; 
And he and his eight hundred 
Shall plough the wave no more. 

W. Cowper 



CLXVI 
BLACK-EYED SUSAN 

All in the Downs the fleet was moor'd, 
The streamers waving in the wind, 

When black-eyed Susan came aboard; 
' O ! where shall I my true-love find? 

Tell me, ye jovial sailors, tell me true 

If my sweet William sails among the crew/ 



228 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

William, who high upon the yard 

Rock'd with the billow to and fro, 
Soon as her well-known voice he heard 

He sigh'd, and cast his eyes below: 
The cord slides swiftly through his glowing hands, 
And quick as lightning on the deck he stands. 

So the sweet lark, high poised in air, 
Shuts close his pinions to his breast 

If chance his mate's shrill call he hear, 
And drops at once into her nest : — 

The noblest captain in the British fleet 

Might envy William's lip those kisses sweet. 

'0 Susan, Susan, lovely dear. 

My vows shall ever true remain; 
Let me kiss off that falling tear; 

We only part to meet again. 
Change as ye list, ye winds; my heart shall be 
The faithful compass that still points to thee. 

'Believe not what the landmen say 
Who tempt with doubts thy constant mind; 

They'll tell thee, sailors, when away, 
In every port a mistress find: 

Yes, yes, believe them when they tell thee so, 

For Thou art present wheresoe'er I go. 

'If to fair India's coast we sail, 

Thy eyes are seen in diamonds bright, 
Thy breath is Afric's spicy gale, 



BOOK THIRD 229 

Thy skin is ivory so white. 
Thus every beauteous object that I view 
Wakes in my soul some charm of lovely Sue. 

^Though battle call me from thy arms 

Let not my pretty Susan mourn; 
Though cannons roar, yet safe from harms 
V WiUiam shall to his Dear return. 
Love turns aside the balls that round me fly, 
Lest precious tears should drop from Susan's eye.' 

The boatswain gave the dreadful word, 
The sails their swelling bosom spread ; 

No longer must she stay aboard; 

They kiss'd, she sigh'd, he hung his head. 

Her lessening boat unwilling rows to land; 

'Adieu!' she cries; and waved her lily hand. 

J. Gay 



CLXVII 
SALLY IN OUR ALLEY 

Of all the girls that are so smart 

There's none Hke pretty Sally; 
She is the darling of my heart, 

And she lives in our alley. 
There is no lady in the land 

Is half so sweet as Sally; 
She is the darling of my heart, 

And she lives in our alley. 



230 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Her father he makes cabbage-nets 

And through the streets does cry 'em; 
Her mother she sells laces long 

To such as please to buy 'em: 
But sure such folks could ne'er beget 

So sweet a girl as Sally! 
She is the darling of my heart, 

And she lives in our alley. 

When she is by, I leave my work, 

I love her so sincerely; 
My master comes like any Turk, 

And bangs me most severely — 
But let him bang his bellyful, 

I'll bear it all for Sally; 
She is the darling of my heart. 

And she lives in our alley. 

Of all the days that's in the week 

I dearly love but one day — 
And that's the day that comes betwixt 

A Saturday and Monday; 
For then I'm drest all in my best 

To walk abroad with Sally; 
She is the darling of my heart. 

And she lives in our alley. 

My master carries me to church, 

And often am I blamed 
Because I leave him in the lurch 

As soon as text is named; 



BOOK THIRD 231 

I leave the church in sermon-time 

And shnk away to Sally; 
She is the darling of my heart, 

And she lives in our alley. 

When Christmas comes about again 

O then I shall have money; 
I'll hoard it up, and box it all, 

I'll give it to my honey: 
I would it were ten thousand pound, 

I'd give it all to Sally; 
She is the darling of my heart, 

And she lives in our alley. 

My master and the neighbours all 

Make game of me and Sally, 
And, but for her, I'd better be 

A slave and row a galley; 
But when my seven long years are out 

O then I'll marry Sally, — 
then we'll wed, and then we'll bed . . . 

But not in our alley! 

H. Carey 

CLXVIII 
A FAREWELL 

Go fetch to me a pint o' wine. 

An' fill it in a silver tassie; 
That I may drink before I go 

A service to my bonnie lassie: 



232 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

The boat rocks at the pier o' Leith, 
Fu' loud the wind blaws frae the ferry, 

The ship rides by the Berwick-law, 
And I maun leave my bonnie Mary. 

The trumpets sound, the banners fly, 

The glittering spears are ranked ready; 
The shouts o' war are heard afar, 

The battle closes thick and bloody; 
But it's not the roar o' sea or shore 

Wad make me langer wish to tarry; 
Nor shout o' war that's heard afar — 

It's leaving thee, my bonnie Mary. 

R. Burns 

CLXIX 

If doughty deeds my lady please 

Right soon I'll mount my steed; 
And strong his arm, and fast his seat 

That bears frae me the meed. 
I'll wear thy colours in my cap 

Thy picture at my heart; 
And he that bends not to thine eye 
Shall rue it to his smart! 

Then tell me how to woo thee. Love; 

O tell me how to woo thee! 
For thy dear sake, nae care I'll take 
Tho' ne'er another trow me. 

If gay attire delight thine eye 
I'll dight me in array; 



BOOK THIRD ^3^ 

I'll tend thy chamber door all night, 

And squire thee all the day. 
If sweetest sounds can win thine ear, 

These sounds I'll strive to catch; 
Thy voice I'll steal to woo thysell. 

That voice that nane can match. 

But if fond love thy heart can gain, 

I never broke a vow; 
Nae maiden lays her skaith to me, 

I never loved but you. 
For you alone I ride the ring. 

For you I wear the blue; 
For you alone I strive to sing, 
tell me how to woo! 

Then tell me how to woo thee, Love; 

O tell me how to woo thee! 
For thy dear sake, nae care I'll take, 
Tho' ne'er another trow me. 

R. Graham of Gartmore 



CLXX 

TO A YOUNG LADY 

Sweet stream, that winds through yonder glade, 

Apt emblem of a virtuous maid — 

Silent and chaste she steals along, 

Far from the world's gay busy throng: 

With gentle yet prevailing force, 

Intent upon her destined course; 



234 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Graceful and useful all she does. 
Blessing and blest where'er she goes; 
Pure-bosom 'd as that watery glass 
And Heaven reflected in her face. 

W. Cowper 

CLXXI 

THE SLEEPING BEAUTY 

Sleep on, and dream of Heaven awhile — 
Tho' shut so close thy laughing eyes, 
Thy rosy lips still wear a smile 
And move, and breathe dehcious sighs! 

Ah, now soft blushes tinge her cheeks 
And mantle o'er her neck of snow: 
Ah, now she murmurs, now she speaks 
What most I wish — and fear to know! 

She starts, she trembles, and she weeps! 
Her fair hands folded on her breast: 
— And now, how like a saint she sleeps! 
A seraph in the realms of rest! 

Sleep on secure! Above control 
Thy thoughts belong to Heaven and thee: 
And may the secret of thy soul 
Remain within its sanctuary ! 

S. Rogers 



BOOK THIRD 235 

CLXXII 

Foe ever, Fortune, wilt thou prove 
An unrelenting foe to Love, 
And when we meet a mutual heart 
Come in between, and bid us part? 

Bid us sigh on from day to day, 
And wish and wish the soul away; 
Till youth and genial years are flown, 
And all the life of life is gone? 

But busy, busy, still art thou, 
To bind the loveless joyless vow. 
The heart from pleasure to delude, 
To join the gentle to the rude. 

For once, O Fortune, hear my prayer, 
And I absolve thy future care; 
All other blessings I resign. 
Make but the dear Amanda mine. 
J. Thomson 

CLXXIII 

The merchant, to secure his treasure, 
Conveys it in a borrow 'd name : 
Euphelia serves to grace my measure. 
But Cloe is my real flame. 

My softest verse, my darling lyre 
Upon Euphelia's toilet lay — 



236 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

When Cloe noted her desire 

That I should sing, that I should play. 

My lyre I tune, my voice I raise. 
But with my numbers mix my sighs; 
And whilst I sing Euphelia's praise, 
I fix my soul on Cloe's eyes. 

Fair Cloe blush'd: EupheUa frown'd: 
I sung, and gazed; I play'd, and trembled: 
And Venus to the Loves around 
Remark'd how ill we all dissembled. 

M. Prior 

CLXXIV 
LOVE'S SECRET 

Never seek to tell thy love, 
Love that never told can be; 

For the gentle wind doth move 
Silently, invisibly. 

I told my love, I told my love, 

I told her all my heart. 
Trembling, cold, in ghastly fears: — 

Ah ! she did depart. 

Soon after she was gone from me 

A traveller came by. 
Silently, invisibly: 

He took her with a sigh. 

W, Blake 



BOOK THIRD 237 

CLXXV 

When lovely woman stoops to folly 
And finds too late that men betray, — 
What charm can soothe her melancholy, 
What art can wash her guilt away? 

The only art her guilt to cover, 
To hide her shame from every eye, 
To give repentance to her lover 
And wring his bosom, is — to die. 

0. Goldsmith 

CLXXVI 

Ye banks and braes o' bonnie Doon 

How can ye blume sae fair! 
How can ye chant, ye little birds. 

And I sae fu' o' care! 

Thou'U break my heart, thou bonnie bird 

That sings upon the bough; 
Thou minds me o' the happy days 

When my fause Luve was true. 

Thou'll break my heart, thou bonnie bird 

That sings beside thy mate; 
For sae I sat, and sae I sang. 

And wist na o' my fate. 

Aft hae I roved by bonnie Doon 
To see the woodbine twine. 



238 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

And ilka bird sang o' its love; 
And sae did I o' mine. 



Wi' lightsome heart I pu'd a rose, 

Frae aff its thorny tree; 
And my fause luver staw the rose, 

But left the thorn wi' me. 

R. Burns 

CLXXVII 
THE PROGRESS OF POESY 

A Pindaric Ode 

Awake, Aeolian lyre, awake, 
And give to rapture all thy trembling strings. 
From Helicon's harmonious springs 

A thousand rills their mazy progress take; 
The laughing flowers that round them blow 
Drink life and fragrance as they flow. 
Now the rich stream of music winds along 
Deep, majestic, smooth, and strong, 
Thro' verdant vales, and Ceres' golden reign; 
Now rolling down the steep amain 
Headlong, impetuous, see it pour: 
The rocks and nodding groves re-bellow to the roar. 

Oh ! Sovereign of the willing soul. 
Parent of sweet and solemn-breathing airs, 
Enchanting shell ! the sullen Cares 

And frantic Passions hear thy soft control, 
On Thracia's hills the Lord of War 



BOOK THIRD 239 

Has curb'd the fury of his car 

And dropt his thirsty lance at thy command. 

Perching on the sceptred hand 

Of Jove, thy magic lulls the feather'd king 

With ruffled plumes, and flagging wing: 

Quench'd in dark clouds of slumber lie 

The terror of his beak, and lightnings of his eye. 

Thee the voice, the dance, obey 

Temper'd to thy warbled lay. 

O'er Idalia's velvet-green 

The rosy-crowned Loves are seen 

On Cytherea's day; 

With antic Sport, and blue-eyed Pleasures, 

Frisking light in frolic measures; 

Now pursuing, now retreating, 

Now in circling troops they meet: 
To brisk notes in cadence beating 

Glance their many-twinkling feet. 
Slow melting strains their Queen's approach declare: 

Where'er she turns, the Graces homage pay: 
With arms sublime that float upon the air 

In gliding state she wins her easy way: 
O'er her warm cheek and rising bosom move 
The bloom of young Desire and purple light of Love. 

Man's feeble race what ills await! 
Labour, and Penury, the racks of Pain, 
Disease, and Sorrow's weeping train. 

And Death, sad refuge from the storms of fate! 
The fond complaint, my song, disprove. 



240 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

And justify the laws of Jove. 
Say, has he given in vain the heavenly Muse? 
Night, and all her sickly dews, 
Her spectres wan, and birds of boding cry 
He gives to range the dreary sky: 
Till down the eastern cliffs afar 

Hyperion's march they spy, and glittering shafts of 
war. 

In climes beyond the solar road 
Where shaggy forms o'er ice-built mountains roam, 
The Muse has broke the twilight gloom 

To cheer the shivering native's dull abode. 
And oft, beneath the odorous shade 
Of Chili's boundless forests laid. 
She deigns to hear the savage youth repeat 
In loose numbers wildly sweet 
Their feather-cinctured chiefs, and dusky loves. 
Her track, where'er the goddess roves. 
Glory pursue, and generous Shame, 
Th' unconquerable Mind, and Freedom's holy flame. 

Woods, that wave o'er Delphi's steep. 
Isles, that crown th' Aegean deep. 
Fields that cool Ilissus laves. 
Or where Ma3ander's amber waves 
In lingering labyrinths creep. 
How do your tuneful echoes languish, 
Mute, but to the voice of anguish ! 
Where each old poetic mountain 
Inspiration breathed around; 



BOOK THIRD 241 

Every shade and hallow' d fountain 

Murmur'd deep a solemn sound: 
Till the sad Nine, in Greece's evil hour 

Left their Parnassus for the Latian plains. 
Alike they scorn the pomp of tyrant Power, 

And coward Vice, that revels in her chains. 
When Latium had her lofty spirit lost. 
They sought, oh Albion! next, thy sea-encircled coast. 

Far from the sun and summer-gale 
In thy green lap was Nature's Darling laid, 
What time, where lucid Avon stray'd. 

To him the mighty Mother did unveil 
Her awful face: the dauntless child 
Stretch'd forth his little arms, and smiled. 
'This pencil take' (she said), 'whose colours clear 
Richly paint the vernal year: 
Thine, too, these golden kej^s, immortal Boy! 
This can unlock the gates of joy; 
Of horror that, and thrilling fears. 
Or ope the sacred source of sympathetic tears.' 

Nor second He, that rode sublime 
Upon the seraph-wings of Extasy 
The secrets of the abyss to spy: 

He pass'd the flaming bounds of place and time: 
The living Throne, the sapphire-blaze 
Where angels tremble while they gaze, 
He saw; but blasted with excess of light. 
Closed his eyes in endless night. 
Behold where Dryden's less presumptuous car 



242 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Wide o'er the fields of glory bear 
Two coursers of ethereal race, 

With necks in thunder clothed, and long-resounding 
pace. 

Hark, his hands the lyre explore! 
Bright-eyed Fancy, hovering o'er. 
Scatters from her pictured urn 
Thoughts that breathe, and words that burn. 
But ah! 'tis heard no more — 
Oh! lyre divine, what daring spirit 
Wakes thee now? Tho' he inherit 
Nor the pride, nor ample pinion. 

That the Theban eagle bear. 
Sailing with supreme dominion 

Thro' the azure deep of air: 
Yet oft before his infant eyes would run 

Such forms as glitter in the Muse's ray 
With orient hues, unborrow'd of the sun: 

Yet shall he mount, and keep his distant way 
Beyond the limits of a vulgar fate: 
Beneath the Good how far — but far above the Great. 

T.Gray 

CLXXVIII 

THE PASSIONS 

An Ode for Music 
When Music, heavenly maid, was young, 
While yet in early Greece she sung, 
The Passions oft, to hear her shell, 



BOOK THIRD 243 

Throng'd around her magic cell 
Exulting, trembling, raging, fainting, 
Possest beyond the Muse's painting; 
By turns they felt the glowing mind 
Disturb'd, delighted, raised, refined: 
'Till once, 'tis said, when all were fired, 
Fill'd with fury, rapt, inspired. 
From the supporting myrtles round 
They snatch' d her instruments of sound, 
And, as they oft had heard apart 
Sweet lessons of her forceful art, 
Each (for Madness ruled the hour) 
Would prove his own expressive power. 

First Fear his hand, its skill to try, 

Amid the chords bewilder'd laid, 
And back recoil' d, he knew not why, 

E'en at the sound himself had made. 

Next Anger rush'd, his eyes on fire. 
In lightnings, own'd his secret stings; 

In one rude clash he struck the lyre 

And swept with hurried hand the strings. 

With woeful measures wan Despair, 
Low sullen sounds, his grief beguiled; 

A solemn, strange, and mingled air, 
'Twas sad by fits, by starts 'twas wild. 

But thou, Hope, with eyes so fair. 
What was thy delighted measure? 



244 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Still it whisper'd promised pleasure 

And bade the lovely scenes at distance hail! 

Still would her touch the strain prolong; 
And from the rocks, the woods, the vale 

She caird on Echo still through all the song; 
And, where her sweetest theme she chose, 
A soft responsive voice was heard at every close; 

And Hope enchanted smiled, and waved her golden 
hair; — 

And longer had she sung : — but with a frown 

Revenge impatient rose: 
He threw his blood-stain'd sword in thunder down; 

And with a withering look 
The war-denouncing trumpet took 
And blew a blast so loud and dread. 
Were ne'er prophetic sounds so full of woe! 

And ever and anon he beat 

The doubling drum with furious heat; 
And, though sometimes, each dreary pause between, 

Dejected Pity at his side 

Her soul-subduing voice applied. 
Yet still he kept his wild unalter'd mien, 
While each strain'd ball of sight seem'd bursting from 
his head. 

Thy numbers. Jealousy, to nought were fix'd: 

Sad proof of thy distressful state! 
Of differing themes the veering song was mix'd; 

And now it courted Love, now raving call'd on 
Hate. 



BOOK THIRD 245 

With eyes up-raised, as one inspired, 

Pale Melancholy sat retired; 

And from her wild sequester'd seat, 

In notes by distance made more sweet, 

Pour'd through the mellow horn her pensive soul : 

And dashing soft from rocks around 

Bubbling runnels join'd the sound; 
Through glades and glooms the mingled measure stole. 
Or, o'er some haunted stream, with fond delay, 

Round an holy calm diffusing, 

Love of peace, and lonely musing, 
In hollow murmurs died away. 

But ! how alter'd was its sprightlier tone 
When Cheerfulness, a nymph of healthiest hue, 

Her bow across her shoulder flung, 

Her buskins gemm'd with morning dew. 
Blew an inspiring air, that dale and thicket rung. 

The hunter's call to Faun and Dryad known! 
The oak-crown'd Sisters and their chaste-eyed Queen, 

Satyrs and Sylvan Boys, were seen 

Peeping from forth their alleys green: 
Brown Exercise rejoiced to hear; 

And Sport leapt up, and seized his beechen spear. 

Last came Joy's ecstatic trial: 
He, with viny crown advancing. 

First to the lively pipe his hand addrest: 
But soon he saw the brisk awakening viol 

Whose sweet entrancing voice he loved the best: 
They would have thought who heard the strain 



246 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

They saw, in Tempe's vale, her native maids 
Amidst the festal-sounding shades 
To some unwearied minstrel dancing; 
While, as his flying fingers kiss'd the strings, 
Love framed with Mirth a gay fantastic round : 
Loose were her tresses seen, her zone unbound; 
And he, amidst his frolic play, 
As if he would the charming air repay, 
Shook thousand odours from his dewy wings. 

O Music! sphere-descended maid, 
Friend of Pleasure, Wisdom's aid! 
Why, goddess! why, to us denied, 
Lay'st thou th}^ ancient lyre aside? 
As in that loved Athenian bower 
You learn'd an all-commanding power. 
Thy mimic soul, O Nymph endear'd, 
Can well recall what then it heard. 
Where is thy native simple heart 
Devote to Virtue, Fancy, Art? 
Arise, as in that elder time. 
Warm, energic, chaste, sublime! 
Thy wonders, in that god-like age, 
Fill thy recording Sister's page; — 
'Tis said, and I believe the tale. 
Thy humblest reed could more prevail, 
Had more of strength, diviner rage. 
Than all which charms this laggard age: 
E'en all at once together found, 
Cecilia's mingled world of sound : — 
bid our vain endeavours cease; 



BOOK THIRD 247 

Revive the just designs of Greece: 
Return in all thy simple state! 
Confirm the tales her sons relate! 

W. Collins 

CLXXIX 

THE SONG OF DAVID 

He sang of God, the mighty source 
Of all things, the stupendous force 

On which all strength depends : 
From Whose right arm, beneath Whose eyes, 
All period, power, and enterprise 

Commences, reigns, and ends. 

The world, the clustering spheres He made, 
The glorious light, the soothing shade, 

Dale, champaign, grove and hill: 
The multitudinous abyss. 
Where secrecy remains in bliss. 

And wisdom hides her skill. 

Tell them, I AM, Jehovah said 

To Moses: while Earth heard in dread, 

And, smitten to the heart. 
At once, above, beneath, around, 
All Nature, without voice or sound, 

Replied, '0 Lord, THOU ART.' 

C. Smart 



248 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

CLXXX 

INFANT JOY 

'I HAVE no name; 

I am but two days old.' 

— What shall I call thee? 
'I happy am; 

Joy is my name.' 

— Sweet joy befall thee! 

Pretty joy! 

Sweet joy, but two days old; 

Sweet joy I call thee: 

Thou dost smile: 

I sing the while, 

Sweet joy befall thee! 

W. Blake 

A CRADLE SONG 

CLXXXI 

Sleep, sleep, beauty bright, 
Dreaming in the joys of night; 
Sleep, sleep; in thy sleep 
Little sorrows sit and weep. 

Sweet babe, in thy face 
Soft desires I can trace. 
Secret joys and secret smiles, 
Little pretty infant wiles. 



BOOK THIRD 249 

As thy softest limbs I feel, 
Smiles as of the morning steal 
O'er thy cheek, and o'er thy breast 
Where thy little heart doth rest. 

Oh the cunning wiles that creep 
In thy little heart asleep! 
When thy little heart doth wake, 
Then the dreadful light shall break. 

W. Blake 

CLXXXII 
ODE ON THE SPRING 

Lo! where the rosy-bosom'd Hours, 

Fair Venus' train, appear. 
Disclose the long-expecting flowers 

And wake the purple year! 
The Attic warbler pours her throat 
Responsive to the cuckoo's note. 
The untaught harmony of Spring: 
While, whispering pleasure as they fly, 
Cool Zephyrs thro' the clear blue sky 

Their gather'd fragrance fling. 

Where'er the oak's thick branches stretch 

A broader, browner shade, 
Where'er the rude and moss-grown beech 

O'er-canopies the glade, 
Beside some water's rushy brink 
With me the Muse shall sit, and think 



250 THE GOLDEX TREASURY 

(At ease reclined in rustic state) 
How vain the ardour of the crowd, 
How low, how little are the proud, 
How indigent the great! 

Still is the toiling hand of Care; 

The panting herds repose: 
Yet hark, how thro' the peopled air 

The busy murmur glows! 
The insect-youth are on the wing. 
Eager to taste the honied spring 
And float amid the liquid noon: 
Some lightly o'er the current skim. 
Some show their gaily-gilded trim 

Quick-glancing to the sun. 

To Contemplation's sober eye 

Such is the race of Man: 
And they that creep, and they that fly, 

Shall end where they began. 
Alike the Busy and the Gay 
But flutter thro' life's little day. 
In Fortune's varying colours drest: 
Brush'd by the hand of rough Mischance, 
Or chill'd by Age, their airy dance 

They leave, in dust to rest. 

Methinks I hear in accents low 

The sportive kind reply: 
Poor moralist! and what art thou? 

A solitary fly! 



BOOK THIRD 251 

Thy joys no glittering female meets, 
No hive hast thou of hoarded sweets, 
No painted plumage to display: 
On hasty wings thy youth is flown; 
Thy sun is set, thy spring is gone — 
We frolic while 'tis May. 

T. Gray 



CLXXXIII 

THE POPLAR FIELD 

The poplars are fell'd; farewell to the shade 
And the whispering sound of the cool colonnade; 
The winds play no longer and sing in the leaves, 
Nor Ouse on his bosom their image receives. 

Twelve years have elapsed since I first took a view 
Of my favourite field, and the bank where they grew; 
And now in the grass behold they are laid. 
And the tree is my seat that once lent me a shade! 

The blackbird has fled to another retreat 
Where the hazels afford him a screen from the heat; 
And the scene where his melody charm'd me before 
Resounds with his sweet-flowing ditty no more. 

My fugitive years are all hasting away, 

And I must ere long lie as lowly as they. 

With a turf on my breast and a stone at my head, 

While another such grove shall arise in its stead. 



252 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

The change both my heart and my fancy employs; 
I reflect on the frailty of man and his joys: 
Short-Hved as we are, yet our pleasures, we see, 
Have a still shorter date, and die sooner than we. 

W. Cowper 

CLXXXIV 

TO A MOUSE 

On turning her up in her nest, with the plough, 
November, 1785 
Wee, sleekit, cow'rin', tim'rous beastie, 

what a panic's in thy breastie! 
Thou need na start awa sae hasty, 

Wi' bickering brattle! 

1 wad be laith to rin an' chase thee 

Wi' murd'ring pattle! 

I'm truly sorry man's dominion 
Has broken Nature's social union. 
An' justifies that ill opinion 

Which makes thee startle 
At me, thy poor earth-born companion, 

An' fellow-mortal! 

I doubt na, whiles, but thou may thieve; 
What then? poor beastie, thou maim Hve! 
A daimen-icker in a thrave 

'S a sma' request: 
I'll get a blessin' wi' the lave, 

And never miss't! 



BOOK THIRD 253 

Thy wee bit housie, too, in ruin! 
Its silly wa's the win's are strewin: 
And naething, now, to big a new ane, 

0' foggage green! 
An' bleak December's winds ensuin' 

Baith snell an' keen! 

Thou saw the fields laid bare an' waste 
An' weary winter comin' fast, 
An' cozie here, beneath the blast, 

Thou thought to dwell, 
Till, crash ! the cruel coulter past 

Out thro' thy cell. 

That wee bit heap o' leaves an' stibble 
Has cost thee mony a weary nibble! 
Now thou's turn'd out, for a' thy trouble, 

But house or hald, 
To thole the winter's sleety dribble 

An' cranreuch cauld! 

But, Mousie, thou art no thy lane 
In proving foresight may be vain : 
The best laid schemes o' mice an' men 

Gang aft a-gley, 
An' lea'e us nought but grief an' pain, 

For promised joy. 

Still thou art blest, compared wi' me! 
The present only toucheth thee: 
But, Och ! I backward cast my e'e 



254 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

On prospects drear! 
An' forward, tho' I canna see, 
I guess an' fear! 

R. Burns 



CLXXXV 

A WISH 

Mine be a cot beside the hill; 
A bee-hive's hum shall soothe my ear; 
A willowy brook that turns a mill, 
With many a fall shall linger near. 

The swallow, oft, beneath my thatch 
Shall twitter from her clay-built nest; 
Oft shall the pilgrim lift the latch. 
And share my meal, a welcome guest. 

Around my ivied porch shall spring 
Each fragrant flower that drinks the dew; 
And Lucy, at her wheel, shall sing 
In russet-gown and apron blue. 

The village-church among the trees. 
Where first our marriage- vows were given, 
With merry peals shall swell the breeze 
And point with taper spire to Heaven. 

S. Rogers 



BOOK THIRD 255 

CLXXXVI 

ODE TO EVENING 

If aught of oaten stop or pastoral song 

May hope, pensive Eve, to soothe thine ear 

Like thy own solemn springs, 

Thy springs, and dying gales; 

O Nymph reserved, — while now the bright-hair'd 

sun 
Sits in yon western tent, whose cloudy skirts, 

With brede ethereal wove, 

O'erhang his wavy bed; 

Now air is hush'd, save where the weak-eyed bat 
With short shrill shriek flits by on leathern wing. 

Or where the beetle winds 

His small but sullen horn, 

As oft he rises midst the twilight path. 
Against the pilgrim borne in heedless hum, — 

Now teach me, maid composed, 

To breathe some soften'd strain 

Whose numbers, stealing through thy darkening vale. 
May not unseemly with its stillness suit; 

As, musing slow, I hail 

Thy genial loved return. 

For when thy folding-star arising shows 
His paly circlet, at his warning lamp 



256 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

The fragrant Hours, and Elves 
Who slept in buds the day, 

And many a Nymph who wreathes her brows with 

sedge 
And sheds the freshening dew, and, lovelier still, 

The pensive Pleasures sweet. 

Prepare thy shadowy car. 

Then let me rove some wild and heathy scene; 
Or find some ruin midst its dreary dells. 

Whose walls more awful nod 

By thy religious gleams. 

Or, if chill blustering winds or driving rain 
Prevent my willing feet, be mine the hut 

That, from the mountain's side, 

Views wilds, and swelling floods, 

And hamlets brown, and dim-discover'd spires; 
And hears their simple bell; and marks o'er all 

Thy dewy fingers draw 

The gradual dusky veil. 

While Spring shall pour his showers, as oft he wont, 
And bathe thy breathing tresses, meekest Eve! 

While Summer loves to sport 

Beneath thy lingering light; 

While sallow Autumn fills thy lap with leaves; 
Or Winter, yelling through the troublous air. 



BOOK THIRD 257 

Affrights thy shrinking train 
And rudely rends thy robes; 

So long, regardful of thy quiet rule, 

Shall Fancy, Friendship, Science, smiling Peace, 

Thy gentlest influence own. 

And love thy favourite name ! 

W. ColUiis 

CLXXXVII 

ELEGY WRITTEN IN A COUNTRY 
CHURCHYARD 

The curfew tolls the knell of parting day. 
The lowing herd wind slowly o'er the lea. 
The ploughman homeward plods his weary way, 
And leaves the world to darkness and to me. 

Now fades the glimmering landscape on the sight, 
And all the air a solemn stillness holds, 
Save where the beetle wheels his droning flight, 
And drowsy tinklings lull the distant folds : 

Save that from yonder ivy-mantled tower 
The moping owl does to the moon complain 
Of such as, wandering near her secret bower. 
Molest her ancient solitary reign. 

Beneath those rugged elms, that yew-tree's shade 
Where heaves the turf in many a mouldering heap, 
Each in his narrow cell for ever laid. 
The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep. 



258 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

The breezy call of incense-breathing morn, 
The swallow twittering from the straw-built shed, 
The cock's shrill clarion, or the echoing horn. 
No more shall rouse them from their lowly bed. 

For them no more the blazing hearth shall burn 
Or busy housewife ply her evening care : 
No children run to lisp their sire's return. 
Or climb his knees the envied kiss to share. 

Oft did the harvest to their sickle yield, 
Their furrow oft the stubborn glebe has broke; 
How jocund did they drive their team afield! 
How bow'd the woods beneath their sturdy stroke! 

Let not ambition mock their useful toil. 
Their homely joys, and destiny obscure; 
Nor grandeur hear with a disdainful smile 
The short and simple annals of the poor. 

The boast of heraldry, the pomp of power. 
And all that beauty, all that wealth e'er gave, 
Awaits alike th' inevitable hour : — 
The paths of glory lead but to the grave. 

Nor you, ye proud, impute to these the fault 

If memory o'er their tomb no trophies raise. 

Where through the long-drawn aisle and fretted vault 

The pealing anthem swells the note of praise. 

Can storied urn or animated bust 

Back to its mansion call the fleeting breath? 



BOOK THIRD 259 

Can honour's voice provoke the silent dust, 
Or flattery soothe the dull cold ear of death? 

Perhaps in this neglected spot is laid 
Some heart once pregnant with celestial fire; 
Hands, that the rod of empire might have sway'd, 
Or waked to extasy the living lyre: 

But knowledge to their eyes her ample page 
Rich with the spoils of time, did ne'er unroll; 
Chill penury repress'd their noble rage. 
And froze the genial current of the soul. 

Full many a gem of purest ray serene 
The dark unfathom'd caves of ocean bear: 
Full many a flower is born to blush unseen, 
And waste its sweetness on the desert air. 

Some village-I|ampden, that with dauntless breast 
The little tyrant of his fields withstood, 
Some mute inglorious Milton here may rest, 
Some Cromwell, guiltless of his country's blood. 

Th' applause of listening senates to command, 
The threats of pain and ruin to despise. 
To scatter plenty o'er a smiling land. 
And read their history in a nation's eyes 

Their lot forbad : nor circumscribed alone 
Their growing virtues, but their crimes confined; 
Forbad to wade thro' slaughter to a throne. 
And shut the gates of mercy on mankind; 



260 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

The struggling pangs of conscious truth to hide, 
To quench the blushes of ingenuous shame, 
Or heap the shrine of luxury and pride 
With incense kindled at the Muse's flame. 

Far from the madding crowd's ignoble strife 
Their sober wishes never learn'd to stray; 
Along the cool sequester'd vale of life 
They kept the noiseless tenour of their way. 

Yet e'en these bones from insult to protect 

Some frail memorial still erected nigh, 

With uncouth rhymes and shapeless sculpture deck'd. 

Implores the passing tribute of a sigh. 

Their name, their years, spelt by th' unletter'd Muse, 
The place of fame and elegy supply: 
And many a holy text around she strews. 
That teach the rustic moralist to die. 

For who, to dumb forgetfulness a prey, 
This pleasing anxious being e'er resign'd. 
Left the warm precincts of the cheerful day, 
Nor cast one longing lingering look behind? 

On some fond breast the parting soul relies. 
Some pious drops the closing eye requires; 
E'en from the tomb the voice of nature cries, 
E'en in our ashes live their wonted fires. 

For thee, who, mindful of th' unhonour'd dead, 
Dost in these lines their artless tale relate; 



BOOK THIRD 261 

If chance, by lonely contemplation led, 
Some kindred spirit shall enquire thy fate, — 

Haply some hoary-headed swain may say, 
'Oft have we seen him at the peep of dawn 
Brushing with hasty steps the dews away, 
To meet the sun upon the upland lawn; 

' There at the foot of yonder nodding beech 
That wreathes its old fantastic roots so high. 
His listless length at noon-tide would he stretch, 
And pore upon the brook that babbles by. 

'Hard by yon wood, now smiling as in scorn, 
Muttering his wayward fancies he would rove; 
Now drooping, woeful-wan, like one forlorn, 
Or crazed with care, or cross'd in hopeless love. 

'One morn I miss'd him on the customed hill. 
Along the heath, and near his favourite tree; 
Another came; nor yet beside the rill, 
Nor up the lawn, nor at the wood was he; 

'The next with dirges due in sad array 
Slow through the church-way path w^e saw him borne, — 
Approach and read (for thou canst read) the lay 
Graved on the stone beneath yon aged thorn/ 

THE EPITAPH 

Here rests his head upon the lap of earth 
A youth, to fortune and to fame unknown; 



262 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Fair science frown'd not on his humble birth 
And melancholy mark'd him for her own. 

Large was his bounty, and his soul sincere; 

Heaven did a recompense as largely send: 

He gave to misery (all he had) a tear, 

He gain'd from Heaven ('twas all he wish'd) a friend. 

No farther seek his merits to disclose, 
Or draw his frailties from their dread abode, 
(There they alike in trembling hope repose,) 
The bosom of his Father and his God. 



T. Gray 



CLXXXVIII 
MARY MORISON 

Mary, at thy window be, 

It is the wish'd, the trysted hour! 
Those smiles and glances let me see 
That make the miser's treasure poor: 
How blithely wad I bide the stoure, 
A weary slave frae sun to sun. 
Could I the rich reward secure, 
The lovely Mary Morison. 

Yestreen when to the trembling string 
The dance gaed thro' the lighted ha', 
To thee my fancy took its wing, — 

1 sat, but neither heard nor saw: 
Tho' this was fair, and that was braw, 



BOOK THIRD 263 

And yon the toast of a' the town, 
I sigh'd, and said amang them a', 
'Ye are na Mary Morison/ 

O Mary, canst thou wreck his peace 

Wha for thy sake wad gladly dee? 

Or canst thou break that heart of liis, 

Whase only faut is loving thee? 

If love for love thou wilt na gie, 

At least be pity to me shown; 

A thought ungentle canna be 

The thought o' Mary Morison. 

R. Burns 

CLXXXIX 
BONNIE LESLEY 

O SAW ye bonnie Lesley 

As she gaed o'er the border? 
She's gane, like Alexander, 

To spread her conquests farther. 

To see her is to love her. 

And love but her for ever; 
For Nature made her what she is. 

And ne'er made sic anither! 

Thou art a queen, Fair Lesley, 

Thy subjects we, before thee; 
Thou art divine, Fair Lesley, 

The hearts o' men adore thee. 



264 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

The Deil he could na scaith thee, 
Or aught that wad belang thee; 

He'd look into thy bonnie face, 
And say ' I canna wrang thee ! ' 

The Powers aboon will tent thee; 

Misfortune sha' na steer thee; 
Thou'rt like themselves sae lovely 

That ill they'll ne'er let near thee. 

Return again, Fair Lesley, 

Return to Caledonie! 
That we may brag we hae a lass 

There's nane again sae bonnie. 

R. Burns, 

CXC 

O MY Luve's like a red, red rose 
That's newly sprung in June: 

my Luve's like the melodie 
That's sweetly play'd in tune. 

As fair art thou, my bonnie lass, 

So deep in luve am I : 
And I will luve thee still, my dear, 

Till a' the seas gang dry: 

Till a' the seas gang dry, my dear, 
And the rocks melt wi' the sun; 

1 will luve thee still, my dear, 
While the sands o' life shall run. 



BOOK THIRD 265 

And fare thee weel, my only Luve! 

And fare thee weel awhile; 
And I will come again, my Luve, 

Tho' it were ten thousand mile. 

R. Burns 

CXCI 
HIGHLAND MARY 

Ye banks and braes and streams around 

The castle o' Montgomery, 
Green be your woods, and fair your flowers, 

Your waters never drumlie! 
There simmer first unfauld her robes. 

And there the langest tarry; 
For there I took the last fareweel 

O' my sweet Highland Mary. 

How sweetly bloom'd the gay green birk. 

How rich the hawthorn's blossom, 
As underneath their fragrant shade 

I clasp'd her to my bosom! 
The golden hours on angel wings 

Flew o'er me and my dearie; 
For dear to me as light and life 

Was my sweet Highland Mary. 

Wi' mony a vow and lock'd embrace 

Our parting was fu' tender; 
And pledging aft to meet again, , 

We tore oursels asunder; 



266 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

But, Oh! fell Death's untimely frost, 

That nipt my flower sae early! 
Now green's the sod, and cauld's the clay, 

That wraps my Highland Mary! 

pale, pale now, those rosy lips, 

I aft hae kiss'd sae fondly; 
And closed for aye the sparkling glance 

That dwelt on me sae kindly; 
And mouldering now in silent dust 

That heart that lo'ed me dearly! 
But still within my bosom's core 

Shall Hve my Highland Mary. 

R. Burns 

CXCII 

AULD ROBIN GRAY 

When the sheep are in the fauld, and the kye at hame. 
And a' the world to rest are gane, 
The waes o' my heart fa' in showers frae my e'e. 
While my gudeman lies sound by me. 

Young Jamie lo'ed me weel, and sought me for his bride; 
But saving a croun he had naething else beside: 
To make the croun a pund, young Jamie gaed to sea; 
And the croun and the pund were baith for me. 

He hadna been awa' a week but only twa, 
When my father brak his arm, and the cow was stown 
awa; 



BOOK THIRD 267 

My mother she fell sick, and my Jamie at the sea — 
And auld Robin Gray came a-courtin' me. 

My father couldna work, and my mother couldna spin; 
I toil'd day and night, but their bread I couldna win; 
Auld Rob maintained them baith, and wi' tears in 

his e'e 
^aid, Jennie, for their sakes, 0, marry me! 

My heart it said nay; I look'd for Jamie back; 
But the wind it blew high, and the ship it was a wrack; 
His ship it was a wrack — why didna Jamie dee? 
Or why do I live to cry, Wae's me? 

My father urgit sair: my mother didna speak; 

But she look'd in my face till my heart was like to 

break : 
They gi'ed him my hand, but my heart was at the sea; 
Sae auld Robin Gray he was gudeman to me. 

I hadna been a wife a week but only four, 
When mournfu' as I sat on the stane at the door, 
I saw my Jamie's wraith, for I couldna think it he 
Till he said, Fm come hame to marry thee. 

sair, sair did we greet, and muckle did we say; 
We took but ae kiss, and I bad him gang away; 

1 wish that I were dead, but I'm no like to dee; 
And why was I born to say, Wae's me! 

I gang like a ghaist, and I carena to spin; 

I daurna think on Jamie, for that wad be a sin; 



268 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

But I'll do my best a gude wife aye to be, 
For auld Robin Gray he is kind unto me. 

Lady A. Lindsay 

CXCIII 
DUNCAN GRAY 

Duncan Gray cam here to woo, 

Ha, ha, the wooing o't; 
On blythe Yule night when we were fou, 

Ha, ha, the wooing o't: 
Maggie coost her head fu' high, 
Look'd asklent and unco skeigh, 
Gart poor Duncan stand abeigh; 

Ha, ha, the wooing o't! 

Duncan fleech'd, and Duncan pray'd; 
Meg was deaf as Ailsa Craig; 
Duncan sigh'd baith out and in, 
Grat his een baith bleer't and blin', 
Spak o' lowpin ower a linn ! 

Time and chance are but a tide, 
Slighted love is sair to bide; 
Shall I, like a fool, quoth he. 
For a haughty hizzie dee? 
She may gae to — France for me! 

How it comes let doctors tell, 
Meg grew sick — as he grew well; 
Something in her bosom wrings, 



BOOK THIRD 269 

For relief a sigh she brings! 

And O, her een, they spak sic things! 

Duncan was a lad o' grace; 
Maggie's was a piteous case; 
Duncan couldna be her death, 
Swelling pity smoor'd his wrath; 
Now they're crouse and canty baith: 
Ha, ha, the wooing o't ! 

R. Burns 

CXCIV 
THE SAILOR'S WIFE 

And are ye sure the news is true? 

And are ye sure he's weel? 
Is this the time to think o' wark? 

Ye jades, lay by your wheel; 
Is this the time to spin a thread, 

When Colin's at the door? 
Reach down my cloak, I'll to the quay, 

And see him come ashore, 
For there's nae luck about the house, 

There's nae luck at li'; 
There's little pleasure in the house 

When our gudeman's awa'. 

And gie to me my bigonet. 

My bishop's satin gown; 
For I maun tell the baillie's wife 

That Colin's in the town. 



270 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

My Turkey slippers maun gae on, 

My stockins pearly blue; 
It's a' to pleasure our gudeman, 

For he's baith leal and true. 

Rise, lass, and make a clean fireside, 

Put on the muckle pot; 
Gie little Kate her button gown 

And Jock his Sunday coat; 
And mak their shoon as black as slaes, 

Their hose as white as snaw; 
It's a' to please my ain gudeman. 

For he's been long awa. 

There's twa fat hens upo' the coop 

Been fed this month and mair; 
Mak haste and thraw their necks about, 

That Colin weel may fare; 
And spread the table neat and clean, 

Gar ilka thing look braw, 
For wha can tell how Colin fared 

When he was far awa? 

Sae true his hef^rt, sae smooth his speech, 

His breath 1" ce caller air; 
His very foot has music in't 

As he comes up the stair — 
And will I see his face again? 

And will I hear him speak? 
I'm downright dizzy wi' the thought. 

In troth I'm like to greet! 



BOOK THIRD 271 

If Colin's weel, and weel content, 

I hae nae mair to crave: 
And gin I live to keep him sae, 

Fm blest aboon the lave: 
And will I see his face again, 

And will I hear him speak? 
Fm downright dizzy wi' the thought, 

In troth Fm like to greet. 
For there's nae luck about the house, 

There's nae luck at a'; 
There's httle pleasure in the house 

When our gudeman's awa'. 

W. J. Mickle 

cxcv 

ABSENCE 

When I think on the happy days 

I spent wi' you, my dearie; 
And now what lands between us lie. 

How can I be but eerie! 

How slow ye move, ye heavy hours, 

As ye were wae abd weary! 
It was na sae ye glinJ-ad by 

When I was wi' my dearie. 

Anon. 



272 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

CXCVI 

JEAN 

Of a' the airts the wind can blaw 

I dearly like the West, 
For there the bonnie lassie lives, 

The lassie I lo'e best: 
There wild woods grow, and rivers row, 

And mony a hill between; 
But day and night my fancy's flight 

Is ever wi' my Jean. 

I see her in the dewy flowers, 

I see her sweet and fair: 
I hear her in the tunefu' birds, 

I hear her charm the air: 
There's not a bonnie flower that springs 

By fountain, shaw, or green. 
There's not a bonnie bird that sings 

But minds me o' my Jean. 

blaw ye westlin winds, blaw saft 

Amang the leafy trees; 
Wi' balmy gale, Qrae hill and dale 

Bring hame the laden bees; 
And bring the lassie back to me 

That's aye sae neat and clean; 
Ae smile o' her wad banish care, 

Sae charming is my Jean. 



BOOK THIRD '273 

What sighs and vows amang the knowes 

Hae pass'd atween us twal 
How fond to meet, how wae to part 

That night she gaed awa! 
The Powers aboon can only ken 

To whom the heart is seen, 
That nane can be sae dear to me 

As my sweet lovely Jean ! 

R. Burns 

CXCVII 

JOHN ANDERSON 

John Anderson my jo, John, 
When we were first acquent 
Your locks were like the raven, 
Your bonnie brow was brent; 
But now your brow is bald, John, 
Your locks are like the snow; 
But blessings on your frosty pow, 
John Anderson my jo. 

John Anderson my jo, John, 
We clamb the hill thegither, 
And mony a canty day, John, 
We've had wi' ane anither: 
Now we maun totter down, John, 
But hand in hand we'll go, 
And sleep thegither at the foot, 
John Anderson my jo. 

R. Burns 



274 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

CXCVIII 

THE LAND O' THE LEAL 

I'm wearing awa', Jean, 

Like snaw when its thaw, Jean, 

I'm wearing awa' 

To the land o' the leal. 
There's nae sorrow there, Jean, 
There's neither cauld nor care, Jean, 
The day is aye fair 

In the land o' the leal. 

Ye were aye leal and true, Jean, 
Your task's ended noo, Jean, 
And I'll welcome you 

To the land o' the leal. 
Our bonnie bairn's there, Jean, 
She was baith guid and fair, Jean; 
O we grudged her right sair 

To the land o' the leal! 

Then dry that tearfu' e'e, Jean, 
My soul langs to be free, Jean, 
And angels wait on me 

To the land o' the leal. 
Now fare ye weel, my ain Jean, 
This warld's care is vain, Jean; 
We'll meet and aye be fain 

In the land o' the leal ! 

Lady Nairn 



BOOK THIRD 275 

CXCIX 

ODE ON A DISTANT PROSPECT OF 
ETON COLLEGE 

Ye distant spires, ye antique towers 

That crown the watery glade, 
Where grateful Science still adores 

Her Henry's holy shade; 
And ye, that from the stately brow 
Of Windsor's heights th' expanse below 
Of grove, of lawn, of mead survey, 
Whose turf, whose shade, whose flowers among 
Wanders the hoary Thames along 

His silver- winding way: 

Ah happy hills ! ah pleasing shade ! 

Ah fields beloved in vain! 
Where once my careless childhood stray'd, 

A stranger yet to pain! 
I feel the gales that from ye blow 
A momentary bliss bestow, 
As waving fresh their gladsome wing 
My weary soul they seem to soothe, 
And, redolent of joy and youth. 

To breathe a second spring. 

Say, Father Thames, for thou hast seen 

Full many a sprightly race 
Disporting on thy margent green 

The paths of pleasure trace; 
Who foremost now delight to cleave 



276 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

With pliant arm, thy glassy wave? 
The captive linnet which enthral? 
What idle progeny succeed 
To chase the rolling circle's speed 
Or urge the flying ball? 

While some on earnest business bent 

Their murmuring labours ply 
'Gainst graver hours that bring constraint 

To sweeten liberty: 
Some bold adventurers disdain 
The limits of their little reign 
And unknown regions dare descry: 
Still as they run they look behind, 
They hear a voice in every wind, 
And snatch a fearful joy. 

Gay hope is theirs by fancy fed, 

Less pleasing when possest; 
The tear forgot as soon as shed, 

The sunshine of the breast: 
Theirs buxom health, of rosy hue, 
Wild wit, invention ever new, 
And lively cheer, of vigour born; 
The thoughtless day, the easy night, 
The spirits pure, the slumbers light 

That fly th' approach of morn. 

Alas! regardless of their doom 

The little victims play; 
No sense have they of ills to come 



BOOK THIRD 277 

Nor care beyond to-day: 
Yet see how all around 'em wait 
The ministers of human fate 
And black Misfortune's baleful train! 
Ah show them where in ambush stand 
To seize their prey, the murderous band! 

Ah, tell them they are men! 

These shall the fury Passions tear, 

The vultures of the mind. 
Disdainful Anger, pallid Fear, 

And Shame that skulks behind; 
Or pining Love shall waste their youth, 
Or Jealousy with rankling tooth 
That inly gnaws the secret heart, 
And Envy wan, and faded Care, 
Grim-visaged comfortless Despair, 

And Sorrow's piercing dart. 

Ambition this shall tempt to rise, 

Then whirl the wretch from high 
To bitter Scorn a sa'^rifice 

And grinning Infamy. 
The stings of Falsehood those shall try 
And hard Unkindness' alter'd eye. 
That mocks the tear it forced to flow; 
And keen Remorse with blood defiled, 
And moody Madness laughing wild 

Amid severest woe. 

Lo, in the vale of years beneath • 

A griesly troop are seen, 



278 THE GOLDEX TREASURY 

The painful family of Death, 

More hideous than their queen: 
This racks the joints, this fires the veins, 
That ever}' labouring sinew strains, 
Those in the deeper vitals rage: 
Lo! Poverty, to fill the band. 
That numbs the soul with icy hand. 
And slow-consuming Age. 

To each his sufferings: all are men, 

Condemn'd alike to groan; 
The tender for another's pain, 

Th' unfeeling for his own. 
Yet, ah! why should they know their fate, 
Since sorrow never comes too late, 
And happiness too swiftly flies? 
Thought would destroy their paradise. 
No more; — where ignorance is bliss, 

'Tis foil}' to be wise. 

T. Gray 

CC 

THE SHRUBBERY 

O HAPPY shades! t© me unblest! 

Friendly to peace, but not to me! 
How ill the scene that offers rest. 

And heart that cannot rest, agree! 

This glassy stream, that spreading pine. 
Those alders quivering to the breeze, 



BOOK THIRD 279 

Might soothe a soul less hurt than mine, 
And please, if anything could please. 

But fix'd unalterable Care 

Foregoes not what she feels within, 

Shows the same sadness everywhere, 
And slights the season and the scene. 

For all that pleased in wood or lawn 

While Peace possess'd these silent bowers,. 

Her animating smile withdrawn, 
Has lost its beauties and its powers. 

The saint or morahst should tread 
This moss-grown alley, musing, slow,. 

They seek like me the secret shade. 
But not, like me, to nourish woe! 

Me, fruitful scenes and prospects waste 

Alike admonish not to roam; 
These tell me of enjoyments past, 

And those of sorrows yet to come. 

W. Cowper 

CCI 
HYMN TO ADVERSITY 

Daughter of Jove, relentless power, 
Thou tamer of the human breast. 

Whose iron scourge and torturing hour 
The bad affright, afflict the best! 



280 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Bound in thy adamantine chain 
The proud are taught to taste of pain, 
And purple tyrants vainly groan 
With pangs unfelt before, unpitied and alone. 

When first thy Sire to send on earth 

Virtue, his darling child, design'd. 
To thee he gave the heavenly birth 

And bade to form her infant mind. 
Stern, rugged nurse; thy rigid lore 
With patience many a year she bore; 
What sorrow was, thou bad'st her know, 
And from her own she learn'd to melt at others' woe. 

Scared at thy frown terrific, fly 

Self-pleasing Folly's idle brood, 
Wild Laughter, Noise, and thoughtless Joy, 

And leave us leisure to be good. 
Light they disperse, and with them go 
The summer friend, the flattering foe; 
By vain Prosperity received, 
To her they vow their truth, and are again believed. 

Wisdom, in sable garb array'd 

Immersed in rapturous thought profound. 
And Melancholy, silent maid, 

With leaden eye, that loves the ground, 
Still on thy solemn steps attend: 
Warm Charity, the general friend. 
With Justice, to herself severe. 
And Pity, dropping soft the sadly-pleasing tear. 



BOOK THIRD 281 

Oh ! gently on thy suppHant's head 

Dread goddess, lay thy chastening hand! 

Not in thy Gorgon terrors clad, 
Nor circled with the vengeful band 

(As by the impious thou art seen) 

With thundering voice, and threatening mien, 

With screaming Horror's funeral cry, 
Despair, and fell Disease, and ghastly Poverty; — 

Thy form benign, oh goddess, wear, 

Thy milder influence impart, 
Thy philosophic train be there 

To soften, not to wound my heart. 
The generous spark extinct revive. 
Teach me to love and to forgive. 
Exact my own defects to scan. 
What others are to feel, and know myself a Man. 

T. Gray 



ecu 

THE SOLITUDE OF ALEXANDER SELKIRK 

I AM monarch of all I survey; 
My right there is none to dispute; 
From the centre all round to the sea 
I am lord of the fowl and the brute. 
O Solitude! where are the charms 
That sages have seen in thy face? 
Better dwell in the midst of alarms, 
Than reign in this horrible place. 



282 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

I am out of humanity's reach, 
I must finish my journey alone, 
Never hear the sweet music of speech; 
I start at the sound of my own. 
The beasts that roam over the plain 
My form with indifference see; 
They are so unacquainted with man, 
Their tameness is shocking to me. 

Society, Friendship, and Love 
Divinely bestow'd upon man. 
Oh, had I the wings of a dove 
How soon would I taste you again! 
My sorrows I then might assuage 
In the ways of religion and truth, 
Might learn from the wisdom of age, 
And be cheer'd by the sallies of youth. 

Ye winds that have made me your sport, 

Convey to this desolate shore 

Some cordial endearing report 

Of a land I shall visit no more : 

My friends, do they now and then send 

A wish or a thought after me? 

O tell me I yet have a friend. 

Though a friend I am never to see. 

How fleet is a glance of the mind! 
Compared with the speed of its flight, 
The tempest itself lags behind. 
And the swift-winged arrows of light. 



BOOK THIRD 283 

When I think of my own native land 
In a moment I seem to be there; 
But alas ! recollection at hand 
Soon hurries me back to despair. 

But the sea-fowl is gone to her nest, 
The beast is laid down in his lair; 
Even here is a season of rest, 
And I to my cabin repair. 
There's mercy, in every place, 
And mercy, encouraging thought! 
Gives even affliction a grace 
And reconciles man to his lot. 

W. Cowper 

CCIII 

TO MARY UNWIN 

Mary! I want a lyre with other strings. 

Such aid from Heaven as some have feign 'd they 

drew, 
An eloquence scarce given to mortals, new 
And undebased by praise of meaner things, 

That ere through age or woe I shed my wings 
I may record thy worth with honour due. 
In verse as musical as thou art true, 
And that immortalizes whom it sings : — 

But thou hast httle need. There is a Book 
By seraphs writ with beams of heavenly light, 
On which the eyes of God not rarely look, 



284 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

A chronicle of actions just and bright — 
There all thy deeds, my faithful Mary, shine; 
And since thou own'st that praise, I spare thee mine. 

W. Cowper 

CCIV 

TO THE SAME 

The twentieth year is well-nigh past 
Since first our sky was overcast; 
Ah would that this might be the last! 
My Mary! 

Thy spirits have a fainter flow, 
I see thee daily weaker grow — 
'Twas my distress that brought thee low. 
My Mary! 

Thy needles, once a shining store, 
For my sake restless heretofore. 
Now rust disused, and shine no more; 
My Mary! 

For though thou gladly wouldst fulfil 
The same kind office for me still, 
Thy sight now seconds not thy will. 
My Mary! 

But well thou play'st the housewife's part. 
And all thy threads with magic art 
Have wound themselves about this heart, 
My Mary! 



BOOK THIRD 285 

Thy indistinct expressions seem 
Like language utter'd in a dream; 
Yet me they charm, whate'er the theme, 
My Mary! 

Thy silver locks, once auburn bright, 
Are still more lovely in my sight 
Than golden beams of orient light, 
My Mary! 

For could I view nor them nor thee, 
What sight worth seeing could I see? 
The sun would rise in vain for me, 
My Mary! 

Partakers of thy sad decline 
Thy hands their little force resign; 
Yet, gently prest, press gently mine, 
My Mary! 

Such feebleness of limbs thou prov'st 
That now at every step thou mov'st 
Upheld by two; yet still thou lov'st, 
My Mary! 

And still to love, though prest with ill, 
In wintry age to feel no chill, 
With me is to be lovely still, 
My Mary! 

But ah ! by constant heed I know • 

How oft the sadness that I show 



2S0 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Transforms thy smiles to looks of woe, 
My Mary! 

And should my future lot be cast 
With much resemblance of the past, 
Thy worn-out heart will break at last — 
My Mary! 

W. Cowper 

CCV 
THE CASTAWAY 

Obscurest night involved the sky, 
The Atlantic billows roar'd, 

When such a destined wretch as I, 
Wash'd headlong from on board. 

Of friends, of hope, of all bereft. 

His floating home for ever left. 

No braver chief could Albion boast 
Than he with whom he went. 

Nor ever ship left Albion's coast 
With warmer wishes sent. 

He loved them both, but both in vain, 

Nor him beheld, nor her again. 

Not long beneath the whelming brine. 

Expert to swim, he lay; 
Nor soon he felt his strength decline. 

Or courage die away; 
But waged with death a lasting strife, 
Supported by despair of life. 



BOOK THIRD 287 

He shouted: nor his friends had fail'd 

To check the vessel's course, 
But so the furious blast prevail'd, 

That, pitiless perforce. 
They left their outcast mate behind, 
And scudded still before the wind. 

Some succour yet they could afford; 

And such as storms allow, 
The cask, the coop, the floated cord, 

Delay'd not to bestow. 
But he (they knew) nor ship nor shore, 
Whatever they gave, should visit mo^-e. 

Nor, cruel as it seem'd, could he 

Their haste himself condenm, 
Aware that flight, in such a sea, 

Alone could rescue them; 
Yet bitter felt it still to die 
Deserted, and his friends so nigh. 

He long survives, who lives an hour 

In ocean, self-upheld; 
And so long he, with unspent power, 

His destiny repell'd; 
And ever, as the minutes flew, 
Entreated help, or cried 'Adieu!* 

At length, his transient respite past. 

His comrades, who before 
Had heard his voice in every blast, 



288 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Could catch the sound no more; 
For then, by toil subdued, he drank 
The stifling wave, and then he sank. 

No poet wept him; but the page 

Of narrative sincere, 
That tells his name, his worth, his age, 

Is wet with Anson's tear: 
And tears by bards or heroes shed 
Alike immortalize the dead. 

I therefore purpose not, or dream, 

Descanting on his fate. 
To give the melancholy theme 

A more enduring date: 
But misery still delights to trace 
Its semblance in another's case. 

No voice divine the storm allay'd. 

No light propitious shone, 
When, snatch'd from all effectual aid, 

We perish'd, each alone: 
But I beneath a rougher sea. 
And whelm'd in deeper gulfs than he. 

W. Cowper 

CCVI 

TOMORROW 

In the downhill of life, when I find I'm decHning, 
May my fate no less fortunate be 



BOOK THIRD 280 

Than a snug elbow-chair will afford for reclining, 

And a cot that o'erlooks the wide sea; 
With an ambling pad-pony to pace o'er the lawn, 

While I carol away idle sorrow. 
And blithe as the lark that each day hails the dawn 

Look forward with hope for Tomorrow. 

With a porch at my door, both for shelter and shade 
^ too. 

As the sunshine or rain may prevail; 
And a small spot of ground for the use of the spade too. 

With a barn for the use of the flail: 
A cow for my dairy, a dog for my game. 

And a purse when a friend wants to borrow; 
I'll envy no Nabob his riches or fame. 

Or what honours maj^ wait him Tomorrow. 

From the bleak northern blast may my cot be com- 
pletely 

Secured by a neighbouring hill; 
And at night may repose steal upon me more sweetly 

By the sound of a murmuring rill : 
And while peace and plenty I find at my board, 

With a heart free from sickness and sorrow. 
With my friends may I share what Today may afford 

And let them spread the table Tomorrow. 

And when I at last must throw off this frail cov'ring 
Which I've worn for three-score years and ten. 

On the brink of the grave I'll not seek to keep hov'ring. 
Nor my thread wish to spin o'er again: 



290 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

But my face in the glass I'll serenely survey, 
And with smiles count each wrinkle and furrow; 

As this old worn-out stuff, which is threadbare Today 
May become Everlasting Tomorrow. 

J. Collins 

CCVII 

Life! I know not what thou art, 
But know that thou and I must part; 
And when, or how, or where we met 
I own to me's a secret yet. 

Life ! we've been long together 
Through pleasant and through cloudy weather; 
'Tis hard to part when friends are dear — 
Perhaps 'twill cost a sigh, a tear; 
— Then steal away, give little warning. 
Choose thine own time; 
Say not Good Night, — but in some brighter clime 

Bid me Good Morning. 

A. L. Barbauld 



BOOK FOURTH 

CCVIII 

TO THE MUSES 

Whether on Ida's shady brow, 
Or in the chambers of the East, 

The chambers of the sun, that now 
From ancient melody have ceased; 

Whether in Heaven ye wander fair, 
Or the green corners of the earth. 

Or the blue regions of the air. 

Where the melodious winds have birth; 

Whether on crystal rocks ye rove 
Beneath the bosom of the sea, 

Wandering in many a coral grove, — 
Fair Nine, forsaking Poetry; 

How have you left the ancient love 
That bards of old enjoy 'd in you! 
The languid strings do scarcely move, 
The sound is forced, the notes are few. 

W. Blake 
291 



292 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

CCIX 

ODE ON THE POETS 

Bards of Passion and of Mirth 
Ye have left your souls on earth! 
Have ye souls in heaven too, 
Double-lived in regions new? 

— Yes, and those of heaven commune 
With the spheres of sun and moon; 
With the noise of fountains wond'rous 
And the parle of voices thund'rous; 
With the whisper of heaven's trees 
And one another, in soft ease 
Seated on Elysian lawns 
Browsed by none but Dian's fawns; 
Underneath large blue-bells tented, 
Where the daisies are rose-scented, 
And the rose herself has got 
Perfume which on earth is not; 
Where the nightingale doth sing 
Not a senseless, tranced thing. 
But divine melodious truth; 
Philosophic numbers smooth; 
Tales and golden histories 
Of heaven and its mysteries. 

Thus ye live on high, and then 
On the earth ye live again; 
And the souls ye left behind you 



BOOK FOURTH 293 

Teach us, here, the way to find you, 

Where your other souls are joying, 

Never slumber'd, never cloying. 

Here, your earth-born souls still speak 

To mortals, of their little week; 

Of their sorrows and delights; 

Of their passions and their spites; 

Of their glory and their shame; 

What doth strengthen and what maim : — 

Thus ye teach us, every day. 

Wisdom, though fled far away. 

Bards of Passion and of Mirth 
Ye have left your souls on earth! 
Ye have souls in heaven too. 
Double-lived in regions new! 



/. Keats 



CCX 



ON FIRST LOOKING INTO CHAPMAN'S 
HOMER 

Much have I travell'd in the realms of gold 
And many goodly states and kingdoms seen; 
Round many western islands have I been 
Which bards in fealty to Apollo hold. 

Oft of one wide expanse had I been told 

That deep-brow'd Homer ruled as his demesne: 

Yet did I never breathe its pure serene 

Till I heard Chapman speak out loud and bold: 



294 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

— Then felt I like some watcher of the skies 
When a new planet swims into his ken; 
Or like stout Cortez, when with eagle eyes 

He stared at the Pacific — and all his men 
Look'd at each other with a wild surmise — 
Silent, upon a peak in Darien. 

J. Keats 

CCXI 

LOVE 

All thoughts, all passions, all delights, 
Whatever stirs this mortal frame. 
All are but ministers of Love, 
And feed his sacred flame. 

Oft in my waking dreams do I 
Live o'er again that happy hour. 
When mid-way on the mount I lay, 
Beside the ruin'd tower. 

The moonshine stealing o'er the scene 
Had blended with the lights of eve; 
And she was there, my hope, my joy, 
My own dear Genevieve! 

She lean'd against the armed man, 
The statue of the armed knight; 
She stood and listen'd to my lay. 
Amid the lingering light. 



BOOK FOURTH 295 

Few sorrows hath she of her own, 
My hope! my joy! my Genevieve! 
She loves me best, whene'er I sing 
The songs that make her grieve. 

I play'd a soft and doleful air, 
I sang an old and moving story — 
An old rude song, that suited well 
That ruin wild and hoary. 

She listen'd with a flitting blush, 
With downcast eyes and modest grace; 
For well she knew, I could not choose 
But gaze upon her face. 

I told her of the Knight that wore 
Upon his shield a burning brand; 
And that for ten long years he woo^d 
The Lady of the Land. 

I told her how he pined: and ah! 
The deep, the low, the pleading tone 
With which I sang another's love 
Interpreted my own. 

She listen'd with a flitting blush, 
With downcast eyes, and modest grace; 
And she forgave me, that I gazed 
Too fondly on her face! 

But when I told the cruel scorn 

That crazed that bold and lovely Knight, 



296 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

And that he cross'd the mountain-woods, 
Nor rested day nor night; 

That sometimes from the savage den, 
And sometimes from the darksome shade, 
And sometimes starting up at once 
In green and sunny glade, — 

There came and look'd him in the face 
An angel beautiful and bright; 
And that he knew it was a Fiend, 
This miserable Knight! 

And that unknowing what he did, 
He leap'd amid a murderous band, 
And saved from outrage worse than deatU 
The Lady of the Land; — 

And how she wept, and clasp'd his knees: 
And how she tended him in vain — 
And ever strove to expiate 

The scorn that crazed his brain; — 

And that she nursed him in a cave, 
And how his madness went away, 
When on the yellow forest-leaves 
A dying man he lay; — 

His dying words — but when I reach'd 
That tenderest strain of all the ditty, 
My faltering voice and pausing harp 
Disturb'd her soul with pity! 



BOOK FOURTH 297 

All impulses of soul and sense 
Had thrill'd my guileless Genevieve; 
The music and the doleful tale, 
The rich and balmy eve; 

And hopes, and fears that kindle hope, 
An undistinguishable throng. 
And gentle wishes long subdued, 
Subdued and cherish'd long! 

She wept with pity and delight, 
She blush'd with love, and virgin shame; 
And like the murmur of a dream, 
I heard her breathe my name. 

Her bosom heaved — she stepp'd aside, 
As conscious of my look she stept — 
Then suddenly, with timorous eye 
She fled to me and wept. 

She half inclosed me with her arms. 
She press'd me with a meek embrace; 
And bending back her head, look'd up, 
And gazed upon my face. 

'Twas partly love, and partly fear, 
And partly 'twas a bashful art 
That I might rather feel, than see, 
The swelling of her heart. 

I calm'd her fears, and she was calm 
And told her love with virgin pride; 



298 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

And so I won my Genevieve, 

^ly bright and beauteous Bride. 

^\ T. Coleridge 

CCXII 
ALL FOR LOVE 

TALK not to me of a name great in story; 

The days of our youth are the days of our glory; 
And the myrtle and ivy of sweet two-and-twenty 
Are worth all your laurels, though ever so plenty. 

What are garlands and crowns to the brow that is 

wrinkled? 
'Tis but as a dead flower with INIay-dew besprinkled: 
Then away with all such from the head that is hoary — 
What care I for the wreaths that can only give glory? 

Oh fame! — if I e'er took delight in thy praises, 
'Twas less for the sake of thy high-sounding phrases, 
Than to see the bright eyes of the dear one discover 
She thought that I was not unworthy to love her. 

There chiefly I sought thee, there only I found thee; 
Her glance was the best of the rays that surround thee; 
When it sparkled o'er aught that was bright in my story, 

1 knew it was love, and I felt it was glory. 

Lord Byron 



BOOK FOURTH 299 

CCXIII 
THE OUTLAW 

O Brignall banks are \\dld and fair, 

And Greta woods are green, 
And you may gather garlands there 

Would grace a summer-queen. 
And as I rode by Dalton-Hall 

Beneath the turrets high, 
A Maiden on the castle-wall 

Was singing merrily: 
' Brignall banks are fresh and fair. 

And Greta woods are green; 
I'd rather rove with Edmund there 

Than reign our English queen.' 

' If, Maiden, thou wouldst wend with me, 

To leave both tower and town. 
Thou first must guess what life lead we 

That dwell by dale and down. 
And if thou canst that riddle read. 

As read full well you may. 
Then to the greenwood shalt thou speed 

As blithe as Queen of May.' 
Yet sung she, 'Brignall banks are fair, 

And Greta woods are green; 
I'd rather rove with Edmund there 

Than reign our English queen. 

' I read you, by your bugle-horn 
And by your palfrey good, 



300 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

I read you for a ranger sworn 

To keep the king's greenwood.' 
'A Ranger, lady, winds his horn, 

An 'tis at peep of Hght; 
His blast is heard at merry morn, 

And mine at dead of night.' 
Yet sung she, ' Brignall banks are fair, 

And Greta woods are gay; 
I would I were with Edmund there 

To reign his Queen of May! 

' With burnish'd brand and musketoon 

So gallantly you come, 
I read you for a bold Dragoon 

That lists the tuck of drum.' 
' I hst no more the tuck of drum, 

No more the trumpet hear; 
But when the beetle sounds his hum 

My comrades take the spear. 
And ! though Brignall banks be fair 

And Greta woods be gay. 
Yet mickle must the maiden dare 

Would reign my Queen of May! 

'Maiden! a nameless life I lead, 

A nameless death I'll die; 
The fiend whose lantern lights the mead 

Were better mate than I ! 
And when I'm with my comrades met 

Beneath the greenwood bough, — 
What once we were we all forgot. 

Nor think what we are now.' 



BOOK FOURTH 301 

Chorus 
' Yet Brignall banks are fresh and fair, 

And Greta woods are green, 
And you may gather garlands there 
Would grace a summer-queen.' 

Sir W. Scott 

CCXIV 

There be none of Beauty's daughters 

With a magic like Thee; 
And like music on the waters 

Is thy sweet voice to me : 
When, as if its sound were causing 
The charmed ocean's pausing, 
The waves lie still and gleaming. 
And the lull'd winds seem dreaming: 

And the midnight moon is weaving 

Her bright chain o'er the deep, 
Whose breast is gently heaving 

As an infant's asleep : • 
So the spirit bows before thee 
To listen and adore thee; 
With a full but soft emotion. 
Like the swell of Summer's ocean. 

Lord Byron 



302 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

ccxv 

THE INDIAN SERENADE 

I ARISE from dreams of Thee 
In the first sweet sleep of night, 
When the winds are breathing low 
And the stars are shining bright : 
I arise from dreams of thee, 
And a spirit in my feet 
Hath led me — who knows how? 
To thy chamber-window, Sweet! 

The wandering airs they faint 
On the dark, the silent stream — 
The champak odours fail 
Like sweet thoughts in a dream; 
The nightingale's complaint 
It dies upon her heart, 
As I must die on thine 

beloved as thou art! 

Oh lift me from the grass! 

1 die, I faint, I fail! 

Let thy love in kisses rain 
On my lips and eyelids pale. 
My cheek is cold and white, alas! 
My heart beats loud and fast; 
Oh! press it close to thine again 
Where it will break at last. 

P. B. Shelley 



BOOK FOURTH 303 



CCXVI 



She walks in beauty, like the night 
Of cloudless climes and starry skies, 
And all that's best of dark and bright 
Meet in her aspect and her eyes; 
Thus mellow'd to that tender light 
Which heaven to gaudy day denies. 

One shade the more, one ray the less, 
Had half impair' d the nameless grace 
Which waves in every raven tress 
Or softly lightens o'er her face. 
Where thoughts serenely sweet express 
How pure, how dear their dwelling-place. 

And on that cheek and o'er that brow 

So soft, so calm, yet eloquent. 

The smiles that win, the tints that glow 

But tell of days in goodness spent, — 

A mind at peace with all below, 

A heart whose love is innocent. 

Lord Byron 

CCXVII 

She was a Phantom of delight 

When first she gleam'd upon my sight; 

A lovely Apparition, sent 

To be a moment's ornament; 

Her eyes as stars of twilight fair; 



304 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Like Twilight's, too, her dusky hair; 
But all things else about her drawn 
From May-time and the cheerful dawn; 
A dancing shape, an image gay, 
To haunt, to startle, and waylay. 

I saw her upon nearer view, 

A Spirit, yet a Woman too! 

Her household motions light and free, 

And steps of virgin-liberty; 

A countenance in which did meet 

Sweet records, promises as sweet; 

A creature not too bright or good 

For human nature's daily food. 

For transient sorrows, simple wiles. 

Praise, blame, love, kisses, tears, and smiles. 

And now I see with eye serene 
The very pulse of the machine; 
A being breathing thoughtful breath, 
A traveller between life and death : 
The reason firm, the temperate will. 
Endurance, foresight, strength, and skill; 
A perfect Woman, nobly plann'd 
To warn, to comfort, and command; 
And yet a Spirit still, and bright 
With something of an angel-light. 

W. Wordsworth 



BOOK FOURTH 305 

CCXVIII 

She is not fair to outward view 

As many maidens be; 
Her loveliness I never knew 

Until she smiled on me. 
O then I saw her eye was bright, 
A well of love, a spring of light. 

But now her looks are coy and cold, 

To mine they ne'er reply, 
And yet I cease not to behold 

The love-light in her eye: 
Her very frowns are fairer far 
Than smiles of other maidens are. 

H. Coleridge 

CCXIX 

I FEAR thy kisses, gentle maiden; 
Thou needest not fear mine; 
My spirit is too deeply laden 
Ever to burthen thine. 

I fear thy mien, thy tones, thy motion; 
Thou needest not fear mine; 
Innocent is the heart's devotion 
With which I worship thine. 

P, B. Shelley 



306 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

ccxx 

She dwelt among the untrodden ways 

Beside the springs of Dove; 
A maid whom there were none to praise, 

And very few to love. 

A violet by a mossy stone 

Half-hidden from the eye! 
— Fair as a star, when only one 
Is shining in the sky. 

She lived unknown, and few could know 

When Lucy ceased to be; 
But she is in her grave, and, oh, 

The difference to me! 

W. Wordsworth 

CCXXI 

I travell'd among unknown men 

In lands beyond the sea; 
Nor, England! did I know till then 

What love I bore to thee. 

'Tis past, that melancholy dream! 

Nor will I quit thy shore 
A second time; for still I seem 

To love thee more and more. 

Among thy mountains did I feel 
The joy of my desire; 



BOOK FOURTH 307 

And she I cherish'd turn'd her wheel 
Beside an Enghsh fire. 

Thy mornings show'd, thy nights conceal'd 

The bowers where Lucy play'd; 
And thine too is the last green field 

That Lucy's eyes survey 'd. 

W. Wordsworth 

CCXXII 

THE EDUCATION OF NATURE 

Three years she grew in sun and shower; 

Then Nature said, 'A lovelier flower 

On earth was never sown: 

This Child I to myself will take; 

She shall be mine, and I will make 

A lady of my own. 

'Myself will to my darling be 

Both law and impulse : and with me 

The girl, in rock and plain, 

In earth and heaven, in glade and bower, 

Shall feel an overseeing power 

To kindle or restrain. 

'She shall be sportive as the fawn 
That wild with glee across the lawn 
Or up the mountain springs; 
And her's shall be the breathing balm, 
And her's the silence and the calm 
Of mute insensate things. 



308 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

'The floating clouds their state shall lend 

To her; for her the willow bend; 

Nor shall she fail to see 

Ev'n in the motions of the storm 

Grace that shall mould the maiden's form 

By silent sympathy. 

'The stars of midnioht shall be dear 

To her; and she shall lean her ear 

In many a secret place 

Where rivulets dance their wayward round, 

And beauty born of murmuring sound 

Shall pass into her face. 

'And vital feelings of delight 

Shall rear her form to stately height, 

Her virgin bosom swell ; 

Such thoughts to Lucy I will give 

While she and I together live 

Here in this happy dell.' 

Thus Nature spake — The work was done — 

How soon my Lucy's race was run! 

She died, and left to me 

This heath, this calm and quiet scene; 

The memory of what has been, 

And never more will be. 

W. Wordsworth 



BOOK FOURTH 309 

CCXXIII 

A SLUMBER did my spirit seal; 

I had no human fears: 
She seem'd a thing that could not feel 

The touch of earthly years. 

No motion has she now, no force; 

She neither hears nor sees; 
Roird round in earth's diurnal course 

With rocks, and stones, and trees. 

W. Wordsworth 



CCXXIV 
A LOST LOVE 

I MEET thy pensive, moonlight face; 

Thy thrilling voice I hear; 
And former hours and scenes retrace, 

Too fleeting, and too dear! 

Then sighs and tears flow fast and free, 

Though none is nigh to share; 
And life has nought beside for me 

So sweet as this despair. 

There are crush'd hearts that will not break; 

And mine, methinks, is one; 
Or thus I should not weep and wake. 

And thou to slumber gone. 



310 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

I little thought it thus could be 
In days more sad and fair — 

That earth could have a place for me, 
And thou no longer there. 

Yet death cannot our hearts divide, 
Or make thee less my own: 

'Twere sweeter sleeping at thy side 
Than watching here alone. 

Yet never, never can we part, 
While Memory holds her reign: 

Thine, thine is still this withered heart, 
Till we shall meet again. 

H. F. Lyte 

CCXXV 

LORD ULLIN'S DAUGHTER 

A Chieftain to the Highlands bound 
Cries ' Boatman, do not tarry ! 
And I'll give thee a silver pound 
To row us o'er the ferry ! ' 

'Now who be ye, would cross Lochgyle, 
This dark and stormy water? ' 
'O I'm the chief of Ulva's isle, 
And this, Lord Ullin's daughter. 

'And fast before her father's men 
Three days we've fled together, 



BOOK FOURTH 311 

For should ho find us in the glen, 
My blood would stain the heather. 

' His horsemen hard behind us ride — 
Should they our steps discover, 
Then who w411 cheer my bonny bride, 
When they have slain her lover? ' 

Out spoke the hardy Highland wight, 
Til go, my chief, I'm ready: 
It is not for your silver bright. 
But for your winsome lady: — 

'And by my word! the bonny bird 
In danger shall not tarry; 
So though the waves are raging white 
I'll row you o'er the ferry.' 

By this the storm grew loud apace, 
The water-wraith was shrieking; 
And in the scowl of Heaven each face 
Grew dark as they were speaking. 

But still as wilder blew the wind. 
And as the night grew drearer, 
Adown the glen rode armed men, 
Their trampling sounded nearer. 

'O haste thee, haste!' the lady cries, 
'Though tempests round us gather; 
I'll meet the raging of the skies, 
But not an angry father.' 



312 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

The boat has left a stormy land, 
A stormy sea before her, — 
When, oh! too strong for human hand 
The tempest gathered o'er her. 

And still they row'd amidst the roar 
Of waters fast prevailing: 
Lord Ullin reach'd that fatal shore, — 
His wrath was changed to wailing. 

For, sore dismay'd, through storm and shade 
His child he did discover; — 
One lovely hand she stretch'd for aid. 
And one was round her lover. 

' Come back ! come back ! ' he cried in grief 
* Across this stormy water : 
And I'll forgive your Highland chief, 
My daughter ! — Oh, my daughter ! ' 

'Twas vain: the loud waves lash'd the shore, 

Return or aid preventing: 

The waters wild went o'er his child, 

And he was left lamenting. 



T, Campbell 



CCXXVI 

LUCY GRAY 

Oft I had heard of Lucy Gray: 
And when I cross 'd the wild, 



BOOK FOURTH 313 

I chanced to see at break of day 
The soUtary child. 

No mate, no comrade Lucy knew; 
She dwelt on a wide moor, 
The sweetest thing that ever grew 
Beside a human door ! 

You yet may spy the fawn at play, 
The hare upon the green; 
But the sweet face of Lucy Gray 
Will never more be seen. 

' To-night will be a stormy night — 
You to the town must go; 
And take a lantern, Child, to light 
Your mother through the snow.' 

'That, Father! will I gladly do: 
'Tis scarcely afternoon — 
The minster-clock has just struck two, 
And yonder is the moon ! ' 

At this the father raised his hook, 
And snapp'd a faggot-band; 
He plied his work ; — and Lucy took 
The lantern in her hand. 

Not blither is the mountain roe: 
With many a wanton stroke 
Her feet disperse the powdery snow, 
That rises up like smoke. 



314 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

The storm came on before its time: 
She wander'd up and down; 
And many a hill did Lucy climb : 
But never reach'd the town. 

The wretched parents all that night 
Went shouting far and wide; 
But there was neither sound nor sight 
To serve them for a guide. 

At day-break on a hill they stood 
That overlook'd the moor; 
And thence they saw the bridge of wood 
A furlong from their door. 

They wept — and, turning homeward, cried 
* In heaven we all shall meet ! ' 
— When in the snow the mother spied 
The print of Lucy's feet. 

Then downwards from the steep hill's edge 
They track'd the footmarks small; 
And through the broken hawthorn hedge, 
And by the long stone-wall: 

And then an open field they cross'd: 
The marks were still the same; 
They track'd them on, nor ever lost; 
And to the bridge they came : 

They follow'd from the snowy bank 
Those footmarks, one by one, 



BOOK FOURTH 315 

Into the middle of the plank; 
And further there were none! 

— Yet some maintain that to this day- 
She is a living child; 
That you may see sweet Lucy Gray 
Upon the lonesome wild. 

O'er rough and smooth she trips along, 
And never looks behind; 
And sings a solitary song 
That whistles in the wind. 

W, Wordsworth 

CCXXVII 
JOCK OF HAZELDEAN 

*Why weep ye by the tide, ladie? 

Why weep ye by the tide? 
I'll wed ye to my youngest son, 

And ye sail be his bride: 
And ye sail be his bride, ladie, 

Sae comely to be seen ' — 
But aye she loot the tears down fa' 

For Jock of Hazeldean. 

*Now let this wilfu' grief be done, 

And dry that cheek so pale; ^ 
Young Frank is chief of Errington 

And lord of Langley-dale; 
His step is first in peaceful ha', 



316 THE OOLDEX TREASURY 

His sword in battle keen ' — 
But aye she loot the tears down fa* 
For Jock of Hazeldean. 

'A chain of gold ye sail not lack, 

Nor braid to bind your hair, 
Nor mettled hound, nor managed hawk, 

Nor palfre}' fresh and fair; 
And you the foremost o' them a' 

Shall ride our forest -queen ' — 
But aye she loot the tears down fa' 

For Jock of Hazeldean. 

The kirk was deck'd at morning-tide, 

The tapers glimmer'd fair; 
The priest and bridegroom wait the bride, 

And dame and knight are there: 
They sought her baith by bower and ha'; 

The ladie was not seen! 
She's o'er the Border, and awa' 

Wi' Jock of Hazeldean. 

Sir W. Scott 

CCXXVIII 

LOVE'S PPHLOSOPHY 

The fountains mingle with the river 
And the rivers with the ocean. 
The winds of heaven mix for ever 
With a sweet emotion; 
Nothing in the world is single. 



BOOK FOURTH 317 

All things ]jy a law divine 

In one another's being mingle — 

Why not I with thine? 

See the mountains kiss high heaven, 
And the waves clasp one another; 
No sister-flower would be forgiven 
If it disdain'd its brother: 
And the sunlight clasps the earth, 
And the moonbeams kiss the sea — 
What are all these kissings worth, 
If thou kiss not me? 

P. B, Shelley 

CCXXIX 

ECHOES 

How sweet the answer Echo makes 
To Music at night 

When, roused by lute or horn, she wakes, 
And far away o'er lawns and lakes 
Goes answering light ! 

Yet Love hath echoes truer far 

And far more sweet 

Then e'er, beneath the moonlight's star, 

Of horn or lute or soft guitar 

The songs repeat. 

'Tis when the sigh, — in youth sincere 
And only then, 



318 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

The sigh that's breathed for one to hear — 
Is by that one, that only Dear 
Breathed back again. 

T. Moore 

CCXXX 

A SERENADE 

Ah! County Guy, the hour is nigh, 

The sun has left the lea. 
The orange-flower perfumes the bower, 

The breeze is on the sea. 
The lark, his lay who trill'd all day, 

Sits hush'd his partner nigh; 
Breeze, bird, and flower confess the hour. 

But where is County Guy? 

The village maid steals through the shade 

Her shepherd's suit to hear; 
To Beauty shy, by lattice high, 

Sings high-born Cavalier. 
The star of Love, all stars above. 

Now reigns o'er earth and sky, 
And high and low the influence know — 

But where is County Guy? 

Sir W. Scott 

CCXXXI 

TO THE EVENING STAR 

Gem of the crimson-colour'd Even, 
Companion of retiring day, 



BOOK FOURTH 319 

Why at the closing gates of heaven, 
Beloved Star, dost thou delay? 

So fair thy pensile beauty burns 
When soft the tear of twilight flows; 
So due thy plighted love returns 
To chambers brighter than the rose; 

To Peace, to Pleasure, and to Love 
So kind a star thou seem'st to be, 
Sure some enamour'd orb above 
Descends and burns to meet with thee. 

Thine is the breathing, blushing hour 
When all unheavenly passions fly, 
Chased by the soul-subduing power 
Of Love's delicious ^\itchery. 

O ! sacred to the fall of day 
Queen of propitious stars, appear. 
And early rise, and long delay. 
When Carolme herself is here! 

Shine on her chosen green resort 
"WTiose trees the sunward summit crown, 
And wanton flowers, that well may court 
An angel's feet to tread them down: — 

Shine on her sweetly scented road 
Thou star of evening's purple dome. 
That lead'st the nightingale abroad, 
And guid'st the pilgrim to his home. 



320 THE aOLDKN TREAS^VRY 

Shine where my ehariner's sweeter breath 
Einbahns the soft exhahng dew, 
Where dying winds a sigh bequeath 
To kiss the eheek of rosy hue: — 

Where, winnow'd by the gentle air, 
Her silken tresses darkly flow 
And fall upon her brow so fair, 
Like shadows on the mountain snow. 

Thus, ever thus, at day's decline 
In converse sweet to wander far — 
O bring with thee my Carohne, 
And thou shalt be my Ruling Star! 

T. Caniphdl 



CCXXXII 

TO THE NIGHT 

Swiftly walk over the Avestern wave, 

Spirit of Night! 
Out of the misty eastern cave 
Where, all the long and lone daylight, 
Thou wo vest dreams of joy and fear 
Which make thee terrible antl dear, — 
Swift be thy flight! 

Wrap thy form in a mantle gray 

Star-inwrought; 
Blind with thine hair the eyes of Day, 
Kiss her until she be wearied out: 



BOOK FOURTH 321 

r 

Then wander o'er city and sea and land, 
Touching all with thine opiate wand — 
Come, long-sought! 

When I arose and saw the da^vn, 

I sigh'd for thee; 
When light rode high, and the dew was gone, 
And noon lay heavy on flower and tree, 
And the weary Day turn'd to his rest 
Lingering like an unloved guest, 

I sigh'd for thee. 

Thy brother Death came, and cried 

Wouldst thou me? 
Thy sweet child Sleep, the filmy-eyed, 
Murmur'd like a noon-tide bee 
Shall I nestle near thy side? 
Wouldst thou me? — And I repHed 

No, not thee! 

Death will come when thou art dead, 

Soon, too soon — 
Sleep will come when thou art fled; 
Of neither would I ask the boon 
I ask of thee, beloved Night — 
Swift be thine approaching flight. 

Come soon, soon! 

P. B. Shelley 



322 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

CCXXXIII 

TO A DISTANT FRIEND 

Why art thou silent? Is thy love a plant 
Of such weak fibre that the treacherous air 
Of absence withers what was once so fair? 
Is there no debt to pay, no boon to grant? 

Yet have my thoughts for thee been vigilant, 
Bound to thy service with unceasing care — 
The mind's least generous wash a mendicant 
For nought but what thy happiness could spare. 

Speak ! — though this soft warm heart, once free to 

hold 
A thousand tender pleasures, thine and mine, 
Be left more desolate, more dreary cold 

Than a forsaken bird's-nest fill'd with snow 
'Mid its own bush of leafless eglantine — 
Speak, that my torturing doubts their end may know ! 

W. Wordsworth 

CCXXXIV 

When we two parted 

In silence and tears, 

Half broken-hearted, 

To sever for years. 

Pale grew thy cheek and cold, 

Colder thy kiss; 



BOOK FOURTH 323 

Truly that hour foretold 
Sorrow to this! 

The dew of the morning 
Sunk chill on my brow; 
It felt like the warning 
Of what I feel now. 
Thy vows are all broken, 
And light is thy fame : 
I hear thy name spoken 
And share in its shame. 

They name thee before me, 
A knell to mine ear; 
A shudder comes o'er me — 
Why wert thou so dear? 
They know not I knew thee 
Who knew thee too well : 
Long, long shall I rue thee, 
Too deeply to tell. 

In secret we met : 

In silence I grieve 

That thy heart could forget, 

Thy spirit deceive. 

If I should meet thee 

After long years, 

How should I greet thee? — 

With silence and tears. 

Lord Byron 



324 THE GOJ.DKX TREASURY 

ccxxxv 

HAPPY INSENSIBILITY 

Ix a droar-nighted Dooeinber, 

Too happy, happy tree, 

Thy branches ne'er renunnber 

Their green fehoity : 

The north cannot undo them 

With a sleety whistle through them, 

Nor frozen thawings glue them 

From budding at the ]')rime. 

In a drear-night ed December, 
Too happy, happy brook. 
Thy bubblings ne'er remember 
Apollo's sunnner look ; 
But with a sweet forgetting 
They stay their crystal fretting, 
Never, never petting 
About the frozen time. 

Ah! would 'twere so with maiiy 
A gentle girl and boy! 
But were there ever aiiy 
Writhed not at passed joy? 
To know the chjxnge and feel it, 
When there is none to heal it 
Nor numbed sense to steal it — 
Was never said in rhyme. 

J. Keats 



BOOK FOURTH 325 

CCXXXVI 

Where shall the lover rest 

Whom the fates sever 
From his true maiden's breast 

Parted for ever? 
Where, through groves deep and high 

Sounds the far billow, 
Where early violets die 

Under the willow. 
Eleu low 

Soft shall be his pillow. 

There through the summer day 

Cool streams are laving: 
There, while the tempests sway. 

Scarce are boughs waving; 
There thy rest shalt thou take, 

Parted for ever. 
Never again to wake 

Never, never! 
Eleu low 

Never, never! 

Where shall the traitor rest. 

He, the deceiver, 
Who could win maiden's breast, 

Ruin, and leave her? 
In the lost battle, 

Borne down by the flying, • 

Where mingles war's rattle 



326 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

With groans of the dying; 

Eleu loro 
There shall he be lying. 

Her wing shall the eagle flap 

O'er the falsehearted; 
His warm blood the wolf shall lap 

Ere life be parted: 
Shame and dishonour sit 

By his grave ever; 
Blessing shall hallow it 

Never, O never ! 
Eleu loro 

Never, never! 

Sir W, Scott 

CCXXXVII 
LA BELLE DAME SANS MERCI 

'O WHAT can ail thee, knight-at-arms, 
Alone and palely loitering? 

The sedge has wither'd from the lake, 
And no birds sing. 

*0 what can ail thee, knight-at-arms! 

So haggard and so woe-begone? 
The squirrel's granary is full, 

And the harvest's done. 

'I see a hly on thy brow 

With anguish moist and fever-dew, 



BOOK FOURTH 327 

And on thy cheeks a fading rose 
Fast withereth too.' 

'I met a lady in the meads, 

Full beautiful — a faery's child, 
Her hair was long, her foot was light, 

And her eyes were wild. 

^ I made a garland for her head, 
And bracelets too, and fragrant zone; 

She look'd at me as she did love, 
And made sweet moan. 

' I set her on my pacing steed 

And nothing else saw all day long, 
For sidelong would she bend, and sing 

A faery's song. 

'She found me roots of relish sweet. 

And honey wild and manna-dew. 
And sure in language strange she said 

''I love thee true." 

'She took me to her elfin grot. 

And there she wept and sigh'd full sore; 

And there I shut her wild wild eyes 
With kisses four. 

'And there she lulled me asleep. 

And there I dream'd — Ah! woe betide! 

The latest dream I ever dream'd 
On the cold hill's side. 



328 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

^I saw pale kings and princes too, 

Pale warriors, death-pale were they all: 

They cried — "La belle Dame sans Merci 
Hath thee in thrall!" 

*I saw their starved lips in the gloam 
With horrid warning gaped wide, 

And I awoke and found me here 
On the cold hill's side. 

*And this is w4iy I sojourn here 

Alone and palely loitering, 
Though the sedge is wither 'd from the lake, 

And no birds sing.' 

J. Keats 

CCXXXVIII 
THE ROVER 

A w^EARY lot is thine, fair maid, 

A w^eary lot is thine! 
To pull the thorn thy brow to braid, 

And press the rue for wine. 
A lightsome eye, a soldier's mien, 

A feather of the blue, 
A doublet of the Lincoln green — 

No more of me you knew 
My Love! 
No more of me you knew. 

' This morn is merry June, I trow. 
The rose is budding fain; 



BOOK FOURTH 329 

But she shall bloom in winter snow 

Ere we two meet again.' 
He turn'd his charger as he spake 

Upon the river shore, 
He gave the bridle-reins a shake, 
Said ' Adieu for evermore 
My Love! 
And adieu for evermore.' 

Sir W. Scott 



CCXXXIX 

THE FLIGHT OF LOVE 

When the lamp is shatter'd 
The light in the dust lies dead — 
When the cloud is scatter'd, 
The rainbow's glory is shed. 
When the lute is broken. 
Sweet tones are remember'd not; 
When the lips have spoken. 
Loved accents are soon forgot. 

As music and splendour 

Survive not the lamp and the lute, 

The heart's echoes render 

No- song when the spirit is mute — 

No song but sad dirges, 

Like the wind through a ruin'd cell. 

Or the mournful surges 

That ring the dead seaman's knell. 



330 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

When hearts have once mingled, 

Love first leaves the well-built nest; 

The weak one is singled 

To endure what it once possesst. 

O Love! who bewailest 

The frailty of all things here, 

Why choose you the frailest 

For your cradle, your home, and your bier? 

Its passions will rock thee 

As the storms rock the ravens on high; 

Bright reason will mock thee 

Like the sun from a wintry sky. 

From thy nest every rafter 

Will rot, and thine eagle home 

Leave thee naked to laughter, 

When leaves fall and cold winds come. 

P. B, Shelley 



CCXL 
THE MAID OF NEIDPATH 

O lovers' eyes are sharp to see, 

And lovers' ears in hearing; 
And love, in hfe's extremity. 

Can lend an hour of cheering. 
Disease had been in Mary's bower 

And slow decay from mourning. 
Though now she sits on Neidpath's tower 

To watch her Love's returning. 



BOOK FOURTH 331 

All sunk and dim her eyes so bright, 

Her form decay'd by pining, 
Till through her wasted hand, at night, 

You saw the taper shining. 
By fits a sultry hectic hue 

Across her cheek was flying; 
By fits so ashy pale she grew 

Her maidens thought her dying. 

Yet keenest powers to see and hear 

Seem'd in her frame residing; 
Before the watch-dog prick'd his ear 

She heard her lover's riding; 
Ere scarce a distant form was kenn'd 

She knew and waved to greet him, 
And o'er the battlement did bend 

As on the wing to meet him. 

He came — he pass'd — an heedless gaze 

As o'er some stranger glancing; 
Her welcome, spoke in faltering phrase, 

Lost in his courser's prancing — 
The castle-arch, whose hollow tone 

Returns each whisper spoken, 
Could scarcely catch the feeble moan 

Which told her heart was broken. 

Sir W. Scott 

CCXLI 

Earl March look'd on his dying child. 
And, smit with grief to view her — 



332 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

The youth, he cried, whom I exiled 
Shall be restored to woo her. 

She's at the window many an hour 

His coming to discover: 
And he look'd up to Ellen's bower 

And she look'd on her lover — 

But ah ! so pale, he knew her not, 

Though her smile on him was dwelling — 

And am I then forgot — forgot? 
It broke the heart of Ellen. 

In vain he weeps, in vain he sighs, 

Her cheek is cold as ashes; 
Nor love's own kiss shall wake those eyes 

To lift their silken lashes. 

T. Camphell ^ 

CCXLII ^^>^^/ 

Bright Star ! would I were steadfast as tliou art — 
Not in lone splendour hung aloft the night. 
And watching, with eternal lids apart. 
Like Nature's patient sleepless Eremite, 

The moving waters at their priestlike task 
Of pure ablution round earth's human shores. 
Or gazing on the new soft fallen mask 
Of snow upon the mountains and the moors : — 

No — yet still steadfast, still unchangeable, 
Pillow'd upon my fair Love's ripening breast 



BOOK FOURTH 333 

To feel for ^er its soft fall and swell, 
Awake for ever in a sweet unrest; 

Still, still to hear her tender-taken breath, 
And so live ever, — or else swoon to death. 

J. Keats 

CCXLIII 

THE TERROR OF DEATH 

When I have fears that I may cease to be 
Before my pen has glean'd my teeming brain. 
Before high-piled books, in charact'ry 
Hold like rich garners the fuU-ripen'd grain; 

When I behold, upon the night's starr'd face, 
Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance, 
And think that I may never live to trace 
Their shadows, with the magic hand of chance; 

And when I feel, fair Creature of an hour! 
That I shall never look upon thee more, 
Never have relish in the faery power 
Of unreflecting love — then on the shore 

Of the wide world I stand alone, and think 
Till Love and Fame to nothingness do sink. 

J. Keats 



-m 



-g^-"^/ 



334 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

CCXLIV 

DESIDERIA 

Surprized by joy — impatient as the wind — 
I turn'd to share the transport — Oh ! with whom 
But Thee — deep buried in the silent tomb, 
That spot which no vicissitude can find? 

Love, faithful love recalled thee to my mind — 
But how could I forget thee? Through what power 
Even for the least division of an hour 
Have I been so beguiled as to be blind 

To my most grievous loss! — That thought's return 
Was the worst pang that sorrow ever bore 
Save one, one only, when I stood forlorn. 

Knowing my heart's best treasure was no more; 
That neither present time, nor years unborn 
Could to my sight that heavenly face restore. 

W. Wordsworth 

CCXLV 

At the mid hour of night, when stars are weeping, I fly 
To the lone vale we loved, when life shone warm in 

thine eye; 
And I think oft, if spirits can steal from the regions 

of air 
To revisit past scenes of delight, thou wilt come to 

me there 
And tell me our love is remember'd, even in the sky! 



BOOK FOURTH 335 

Then I sing the wild song it once was rapture to hear 
When our voices, commingling, breathed like one on 

the ear; 
And as Echo far off through the vale my sad orison rolls, 
I think, oh my Love! 'tis thy voice, from the King- 
dom of Souls 
Faintly answering still the notes that once were so 
dear. 

T. Moore 
CCXLVI 

ELEGY ON THYRZA 

And thou art dead, as young and fair 

As aught of mortal birth; 
And forms so soft and charms so rare 

Too soon return'd to Earth ! 
Though Earth received them in her bed, 
And o'er the spot the crowd may tread 

In carelessness or mirth. 
There is an eye which could not brook 
A moment on that grave to look. 

I will not ask where thou liest low 

Nor gaze upon the spot; 
There flowers or weeds at will may grow 

So I behold them not: 
It is enough for me to prove 
That what I loved, and long must love, 

Like common earth can rot; 
To me there needs no stone to tell 
'Tis Nothing that I loved so well. 



336 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Yet did I love thee to the ljv<t. 

As fen^ntly as tiuni 
Who didst T\ot ohiU\Jiv thnuigh all tho past 

Aud crtust not alter lunw 
The love where Dt^atli has set his sonl 
Nor .liit^ oai\ o)iilK nv^r rival steal, 

>y».n lalseh^Hxi dis^nvow: 
And, what uoro worso. thou canst not st>e 
Or wroiig. or ehaii^v. or fault in nio. 

The In^tter daN^s of life were ours; 

The worst can be but mine: 
The sun that cheers, the storm that lours, 

Shall never niort^ W thine. 
The sileni^e of that drt^ainU\ss sltn^p 
I envy now too much to wtvp ; 

Nor ntwi I to repine 
That all tluv^^ charms have passM away 
I might have watch'd thixnigh long decay. 

The flower in ripen\i bKxMn unmatoh'd 

Must fall the earliest jio^y : 
Though by no hand untimely snat».'h\i. 

Tho leaves n\ust divp away. 
And yet it were a greater grief 
To watch it withering, leaf by loaf. 

Than stv it pluck'd t<.xlay : 
Since earthly eye but ill can bear 
To trace the change to foul from fair. 

I know not if I could have Uune 
To <tv thy beauties fade; 



V/)()K rOf.kTK 337 

T\i(; u'l^jii that foJlowVJ .such a mom 

fia^J worn a (U'Ai\H'S -ihiule: 
Thy day without a cloud hath pa»t, 
And thou wf;rt lovf;Iy t/j thf; lant, 

Extin^jLnh'd, not decay VJ; 
A« «tarH that Hhrx»t along the «*ky 
Shine brighitejjt a8 they fall from high. 

A.S onf;^j I wejr^t, if I could weep, 

My t^rarn rnigl^it well U-. nhfA 
To think I wa.-; not near, to keep 

(}Tie vigil o'er thy \}*A : 
To gaze, how fondly! on thy face, 
To fold thf^' in a faint embrace, 

Uphold thy dro<jping head; 
AruJ nhow that love, however vain, 
Nor thou nor I can feel again. 

Yet how much If^s it were to gain. 

Though thou haiit left me free. 
The loveliest things that still remain 

Than thu.s remember thee! 
The all of thine that cannot die 
Through dark and drearl Eternity 

Rc-tum.s a^ain to me, 
And more thy buried love endears 
Than auglit except its living years. 

Lr/rd Byron 



338 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

CCXLVII 

One word is too often profaned 

For nie to profane it, 
One feeling too falsely disdain'd 

For thee to disdain it. 
One hope is too like despair 

For prudence to smother, 
And pity from thee more dear 

Than that from another. 

I can give not what men call love; 

But wilt thou accept not 
The worship the heart lifts above 

And the Heavens reject not: 
The desire of the moth for the star, 

Of the night for the morrow, 
The devotion to something afar 

From the sphere of our sorrow? 

P. B. Shelley 

CCXLVIII 

GATHERING SONG OF DONALD THE 
BLACK 

Pibroch of Donuil Dhu 

Pibroch of Donuil 
Wake thy wild voice anew, 

Summon Clan Conuil. 
Come away, come away. 

Hark to the summons! 



BOOK FOURTH 339 

Come in your war-array, 
Gentles and commons. 

Come from deep glen, and 

From mountain so rocky; 
The war-pipe and pennon 

Are at Inverlocky. 
Come every hill-plaid, and 

True heart that wears one, 
Come every steel blade, and 

Strong hand that bears one. 

Leave untended the herd. 

The flock without shelter; 
Leave the corpse uninterr'd. 

The bride at the altar; 
Leave the deer, leave the steer, 

Leave nets and barges: 
Come with your fighting gear, 

Broadswords and targes. 

Come as the winds come, when 

Forests are rended. 
Come as the waves come, when 

Navies are stranded: 
Faster come, faster come. 

Faster and faster, 
Chief, vassal, page and groom. 

Tenant and master. 

Fast they come, fast they come; 
See how they gather! 



340 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Wide waves the eagle plume 

Blended with heather. 
Cast your plaids, draw your blades, 

Forward each man set! 
Pibroch of Donuil Dhu 

Knell for the onset! 

Sir W. Scott 



CCXLIX 

A WET sheet and a flowing sea, 

A wind that follows fast 
And fills the white and rustling sail 

And bends the gallant mast; 
And bends the gallant mast, my boys, 

While like the eagle free 
Away the good ship flies, and leaves 

Old England on the lee. 

O for a soft and gentle wind ! 

I heard a fair one cry; 
But give to me the snoring breeze 

And white waves heaving high; 
And white waves heaving high, my lads, 

The good ship tight and free — 
The world of waters is our home, 

And merry men are we. 

There's tempest in yon horned moon. 

And lightning in yon cloud; 
But hark the music, mariners! 



BOOK FOURTH 341 

The wind is piping loud; 
The wind is piping loud, my boys, 

The lightning flashes free — 
While the hollow oak our palace is, 

Our heritage the sea. 

A. Cunningham 



CCL 

Ye Mariners of England 

That guard our native seas! 

Whose flag has braved, a thousand years. 

The battle and the breeze! 

Your glorious standard launch again 

To match another foe: 

And sweep through the deep. 

While the stormy winds do blow; 

While the battle rages loud and long 

And the stormy winds do blow. 

The spirits of your fathers 

Shall start from every wave — 

For the deck it was their field of fame. 

And Ocean was their grave : 

Where Blake and mighty Nelson fell 

Your manly hearts shall glow, 

As ye sweep through the deep, 

While the stormy winds do blow; 

While the battle rages loud and long 

And the stormy winds do blow. 



342 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Britannia needs no bulwarks, 

No towers along the steep; 

Her march is o'er the mountain-waves, 

Her home is on the deep. 

With thunders from her native oak 

She quells the floods below — 

As they roar on the shore, 

When the stormy winds do blow; 

When the battle rages loud and long. 

And the stormy winds do blow. 

The meteor flag of England 

Shall yet terrific burn; 

Till danger's troubled night depart 

And the star of peace return. 

Then, then, ye ocean-warriors! 

Our song and feast shall flow 

To the fame of your name. 

When the storm has ceased to blow; 

When the fiery fight is heard no more, 

And the storm has ceased to blow. 

T. Campbell 

CCLI 

BATTLE OF THE BALTIC 

Of Nelson and the North 

Sing the glorious day's renown, 

When to battle fierce came forth 

All the might of Denmark's crown. 

And her arms along the deep proudly shone; 



BOOK FOURTH 343 

By each gun the hghted brand 
In a bold determined hand, 
And the Prince of all the land 
Led them on. 

Like leviathans afloat 

Lay their bulwarks on the brine; 

While the sign of battle flew 

On the lofty British line: 

It was ten of April morn by the chime: 

As they drifted on their path 

There was silence deep as death; 

And the boldest held his breath 

For a time. 

But the might of England flush'd 

To anticipate the scene; 

And her van the fleeter rush'd 

O'er the deadly space between. 

' Hearts of oak ! ' our captains cried, when each gun 

From its adamantine hps 

Spread a death-shade round the ships, 

Like the hurricane eclipse 

Of the sun. 

Again! again! again! 

And the havoc did not slack, 

Till a feeble cheer the Dane 

To our cheering sent us back; — 

Their shots along the deep slowly boom: — 

Then ceased — and all is wail. 



344 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

As they strike the shatter'd sail; 
Or in conflagration pale 
Light the gloom. 

Out spoke the victor then 

As he hail'd them o'er the wave, 

* Ye are brothers! ye are men! 

And we conquer but to save : — 

So peace instead of death let us bring: 

But yield, proud foe, thy fleet 

With the crews, at England's feet, 

And make submission meet 

To our King.' 

Then Denmark bless'd our chief 

That he gave her wounds repose; 

And the sounds of joy and grief 

From her people wildly rose, 

As death withdrew his shades from the day: 

While the sun look'd smiling bright 

O'er a wide and woeful sight. 

Where the fires of funeral light 

Died away. 

Now joy, old England, raise! 

For the tidings of thy might, 

By the festal cities' blaze. 

Whilst the wine-cup shines in light; 

And yet amidst that joy and uproar, 

Let us think of them that sleep 

Full many a fathom deep 



BOOK FOURTH 345 

By thy wild and stormy steep, 
Elsinore! 

Brave hearts! to Britain's pride 
Once so faithful and so true, 
On the deck of fame that died, 
With the gallant good Riou: 
Soft sigh the winds of Heaven o'er their grave! 
^ While the billow mournful rolls 
And the mermaid's song condoles 
Singing glory to the souls 
Of the brave! 

T. Campbell 

CCLII 

ODE TO DUTY 

Stern Daughter of the Voice of God! 
O Duty! if that name thou love 
Who art a light to guide, a rod 
To check the erring, and reprove; 
Thou who art victory and law 
When empty terrors overawe; 
From vain temptations dost set free, 
And calm'st the weary strife of frail humanity! 

There are who ask not if thine eye 
Be on them ; who, in love and truth 
Where no misgiving is, rely 
Upon the genial sense of youth : 
Glad hearts! without reproach or blot, 



346 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Who do thy work, and know it not: 
Oh! if through confidence misplaced 
They fail, thy saving arms, dread Power ! around them 
cast. 

Serene will be our days and bright 
And happy will our nature be 
When love is an unerring light, 
And joy its own security. 
And they a blissful course may hold 
Ev'n now, who, not unwisely bold. 
Live in the spirit of this creed; 
Yet seek thy firm support, according to their need. 

I, loving freedom, and untried. 
No sport of every random gust. 
Yet being to myself a guide, 
Too blindly have reposed my trust : 
And oft, when in my heart was heard 
Thy timely mandate, I deferr'd 
The task, in smoother walks to stray; 
But thee I now would serve more strictly, if I may. 

Through no disturbance of my soul 
Or strong compunction in me wrought, 
I supplicate for thy controul, 
But in the quietness of thought : 
Me this unchartered freedom tires; 
I feel the weight of chance-desires: 
My hopes no more must change their name; 
I long for a repose that ever is the same. 



BOOK FOURTH 347 

Stern Lawgiver! yet thou dost wear 
The Godhead's most benignant grace; 
Nor know we anything so fair 
As is the smile upon thy face : 
Flowers laugh before thee on their beds, 
And fragrance in thy footing treads; 
Thou dost preserve the Stars from wrong; 
And the most ancient Heavens, through Thee, are fresh 
and strong. 

To humbler functions, awful Power! 
I call thee : I myself commend 
Unto thy guidance from this hour; 
Oh let my weakness have an end! 
Give unto me, made lowly wise, 
The spirit of self-sacrifice; 
The confidence of reason give; 
And in the light of truth thy Bondman let me live. 

W. Wordsworth 

CCLIII 

ON THE CASTLE OF CHILLON 

Eternal Spirit of the chainless Mind! 
Brightest in dungeons, Liberty! thou art. 
For there thy habitation is the heart — 
The heart which love of Thee alone can bind; 

And when thy sons to fetters are consign'd, 
To fetters, and the damp vault's dayless gloom, 
Their country conquers with their martyrdom. 
And Freedom's fame finds wings on every wind. 



348 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Chillon! thy prison is a holy place 

And thy sad floor an altar, for 'twas trod, 

Until his very steps have left a trace 

Worn as if thy cold pavement were a sod, 
By Bonnivard ! May none those marks efface ! 
For they appeal from tyranny to God. 

Lord Byron 

CCLIV 

ENGLAND AND SWITZERLAND, 1802 

Two Voices are there; one is of the Sea, 
One of the Mountains; each a mighty voice: 
In both from age to age thou didst rejoice, 
They were thy chosen music, Liberty! 

There came a tyrant, and with holy glee 
Thou fought'st against him, — but hast vainly striven; 
Thou from thy Alpine holds at length art driven, 
Where not a torrent murmurs heard by thee. 

— Of one deep bliss thine ear hath been bereft ; 
Then cleave, O cleave to that which still is left — 
For, high-soul'd Maid, what sorrow would it be 

That Mountain floods should thunder as before, 
And Ocean bellow from his rocky shore. 
And neither awful Voice be heard by Thee! 

W. Wordsworth 



BOOK FOURTH 349 

CCLV 

ON THE EXTINCTION OF THE VENETIAN 
REPUBLIC 

Once did She hold the gorgeous East in fee 
And was the safeguard of the West; the worth 
Of Venice did not fall below her birth, 
Venice, the eldest child of Liberty. 

She was a maiden city, bright and free; 
No guile seduced, no force could violate; 
And when she took unto herself a mate. 
She must espouse the everlasting Sea. 

And what if she had seen those glories fade. 
Those titles vanish, and that strength decay, — 
Yet shall some tribute of regret be paid 

When her long life hath reach'd its final day: 
Men are we, and must grieve when even the shade 
Of that which once was great is pass'd away. 

W. Wordsworth 

CCLVI 

LONDON, 1802 

O Friend ! I know not which way I must look 

For comfort, being, as I am, opprest 

To think that now our hfe is only drest 

For show; mean handy-work of craftsman, cook, 



350 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Or groom ! — We must run glittering like a brook 
In the open sunshine, or we are unblest; 
The wealthiest man among us is the best : 
No grandeur now in nature or in book 

Delights us. Rapine, avarice, expense, 

This is idolatry ; and these we adore : 

Plain living and high thinking are no more: . 

The homely beauty of the good old cause 
Is gone; our peace, our fearful innocence. 
And pure religion breathing household laws. 

W. Wordsworth 



CCLVII 

THE SAME 

Milton! thou shouldst be living at this hour: 
England hath need of thee : she is a fen 
Of stagnant waters : altar, sword, and pen, 
Fireside, the heroic wealth of hall and bower, 

Have forfeited their ancient English dower 
Of inward happiness. We are selfish men: 
Oh! raise us up, return to us again; 
And give us manners, virtue, freedom, power. 

Thy soul was like a Star, and dwelt apart : 

Thou hadst a voice whose sound was like the sea, 

Pure as the naked heavens, majestic, free; 



BOOK FOURTH 351 

So didst thou travel on life's common way 
In cheerful godliness; and yet thy heart 
The lowliest duties on herself did lay, 

W. Wordsworth 

CCLVIII 

When I have borne in memory what has tamed 
Great nations; how ennobling thoughts depart 
When men change swords for ledgers, and desert 
The student's bower for gold, — some fears urmamed 

I had, my Country! — am I to be blamed? 
Now, when I think of thee, and what thou art, 
Verily, in the bottom of my heart 
Of those unfilial fears I am ashamed. 

For dearly must we prize thee; we who find 
In thee a bulwark for the cause of men; 
And I by my affection was beguiled: 

What wonder if a Poet now and then, 
Among the many movements of his mind, 
Felt for thee as a lover or a child ! 

W. Wordsworth 

CCLIX 

HOHENLINDEN 

On Linden, when the sun was low, 
All bloodless lay the untrodden snow; 
And dark as winter was the flow 
Of Iser, rolling rapidly. 



352 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

But Linden saw another sight, 
When the drum beat at dead of night 
Commanding fires of death to hght 
The darkness of her scenery. 

By torch and trumpet fast array 'd 
Each horseman drew his battle-blade, 
And furious every charger neigh'd 
To join the dreadful revelry. 

Then shook the hills with thunder riven; 
Then rush'd the steed, to battle driven; 
And louder than the bolts of Heaven 
Far flash'd the red artillery. 

But redder yet that light shall glow 
On Linden's hills of stained snow; 
And bloodier yet the torrent flow 
Of Iser, rolling rapidly. 

'Tis morn; but scarce yon level sun 
Can pierce the war-clouds rolling dun, 
Where furious Frank and fiery Hmi 
Shout in their sulphurous canopy. 

The combat deepens. On, ye Brave 
Who rush to glory, or the grave! 
Wave, Munich ! all thy banners wave, 
And charge with all thy chivalry! 

Few, few shall part, where many meet! 
The snow shall be their winding-sheet, 



BOOK FOURTH 353 

And every turf beneath their feet 
Shall be a soldier's sepulchre. 

T. Campbell 

CCLX 
AFTER BLENHEIM 

It was a summer evening, 

Old Kaspar's work was done, 
And he before his cottage door 

Was sitting in the sun; 
And by him sported on the green 
His Httle grandchild Wilhelmine. 

She saw her brother Peterkin 

Roll something large and round 
Which he beside the rivulet 

In playing there had found; 
He came to ask what he had found 
That was so large and smooth and round. 

Old Kaspar took it from the boy 

Who stood expectant by; 
And then the old man shook his head. 

And with a natural sigh 
"Tis some poor fellow's skull,' said he, 
'Who fell in the great victory. 

'I find them in the garden. 

For there's many here about; 
And often when I go to plough * 



354 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

The ploughshare turns them out. 
For many thousand men/ said he, 
'Were slain in that great victory/ 

'Now tell us what 'twas all about/ 

Young Peterkin he cries; 
And httle Wilhelmine looks up 

With wonder-waiting eyes; 
'Now tell us all about the war, 
And what they fought each other for/ 

'It was the English,' Kaspar cried, 
'Who put the French to rout; 

But what they fought each other for 
I could not well make out. 

But everybody said,' quoth he, 

'That 'twas a famous victory.' 

'My father lived at Blenheim then, 
Yon little stream hard by; 

They burnt his dwelling to the ground, 
And he was forced to fly: 

So with his wife and child he fled, 

Nor had he where to rest his head. 

'With fire and sword the country round 

Was wasted far and wide 
And many a childing mother then 

And newborn baby died : 
But things like that, you know, must be 
At every famous victory. 



BOOK FOURTH 355 

'They say it was a shocking sight 

After the field was won; 
For many thousand bodies here 

Lay rotting in the sun: 
But things like that, you know, must be 
After a famous victory. 

'Great praise the Duke of Marlbro' won 

And our good Prince Eugene;' 
'Why 'twas a very wicked thing!' 

Said little Wilhelmine; 
'Nay . . nay . . my little girl/ quoth he, 
'It was a famous victory. 

'And everybody praised the Duke 

Who this great fight did win.' 
'But what good came of it at last? ' 

Quoth little Peterkin: — 
'Why that I cannot tell,' said he, 
'But 'twas a famous victory.' 

R. Southey 

CCLXI 
PRO PATRIA MORI 

When he who adores thee has left but the name 

Of his fault and his sorrows behind. 
Oh! say wilt thou weep, when they darken the fame 

Of a fife that for thee was resign'd! 
Yes, weep, and however my foes may condemn, 

Thy tears shall efface their decree; 



350 THE aOLDEN TRFASlin' 

For. lIoa\on can witnoss. thouiih guilty to thorn, 
1 have boon but too faitht'ul to tluH\ 

With thee woro tho droanis ot' my oarHost lovo; 

Every thought ot* ni>- roasou A\as thino: 
In luy hist luunblo prayor to the S[>irit above 

Thy name shall be niiniiled with mine! 
Oh! blest are the lovers and friends who shall live 

The days of thy glory to see; 
But the next dearest blessing that Heaven ean give 

Is the pride of thus dying for thee. 

T. Moore 

CCLXII 

THE BURIAL OF SIR JOHN ^lOORE 
AT CORI'XNA 

Not a drum was heard, not a funeral note. 
As his corpse to the rampart we hurried; 

Not a soldier discharged his farewc^ll shot 
O'er the grave where oiu' hero wt^ buried. 

We buried him darkly at dead of night, 
The sods with our bayonets turning; 

By the struggling moonbtwm's misty light 
Aiid the hmtern dimly burning. 

No useless cottm enclosed his breast, 

Not iu sheet or in shroud we wound him; 

But he lay like a warrior taking his rest. 
With his martial cloak around him. 



BOOK FOURTH 357 

Few and short were the prayers we said, 

And we spoke not a word of sorrow; 
But we steadfastly gazed on the face that was dead, 

And we bitterly thought of the morrow. 

We thought, as we hoUow'd his narrow bed 

And smoothed down his lonely pillow, 
That the foe and the stranger would tread o'er his 
head, 

And we far away on the billow! 

Lightly they'll talk of the spirit that's gone 
And o'er his cold ashes upVjraid him, — 

But little he'll reck, if they let him sleep on 
In the grave where a Briton has laid him. 

But half of our hea\^ task was done 

When the clock struck the hour for retiring: 

And we heard the distant and random gim 
That the foe was sullenly firing. 

Slowly and sadly we laid him down. 

From the field of his fame fresh and gory; 

We carved not a line, and we raised not a stone, 
But we left him alone ^ith his glory. 

C. Wolfe 



358 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

CCLXIII 

SIMON LEE THE OLD HUNTSMAN 

In the sweet shire of Cardigan, 
Not far from pleasant Ivor Hall, 
An old man dwells, a little man, — 
'Tis said he once was tall. 
Full five-and-thirty years he lived 
A running huntsman merry; 
And still the centre of his cheek 
Is red as a ripe cherry. 

No man like him the horn could sound. 

And hill and valley rang with glee. 

When Echo bandied, round and round, 

The halloo of Simon Lee. 

In those proud days he little cared 

For husbandry or tillage; 

To blither tasks did Simon rouse 

The sleepers of the village. 

He all the country could outrun, 

Could leave both man and horse behind; 

And often, ere the chase was done 

He reel'd and was stone-blind. 

And still there's something in the world 

At which his heart rejoices; 

For when the chiming hounds are out, 

He dearly loves their voices. 

But oh the heavy change ! — bereft 

Of health, strength, friends and kindred, see! 



BOOK FOURTH 359 

Old Simon to the world is left 

In liveried poverty : — 

His master's dead, and no one now 

Dwells in the Hall of Ivor; 

Men, dogs, and horses, all are dead; 

He is the sole survivor. 

And he is lean and he is sick, 
His body, dwindled and awry, 
Rests upon ankles swoln and thick; 
His legs are thin and dry. 
One prop he has, and only one, — 
His wife, an aged woman, 
Lives with him, near the waterfall, 
Upon the village common. 

Beside their moss-grown hut of clay. 
Not twenty paces from the door, 
A scrap of land they have, but they 
Are poorest of the poor. 
This scrap of land he from the heath 
Enclosed when he was stronger; 
But what to them avails the land 
Which he can till no longer? 

Oft, working by her husband's side, 
Ruth does what Simon cannot do; 
For she, with scanty cause for pride, 
Is stouter of the two. 
And, though you with your utmost skill 
From labour could not wean them, 



360 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

'Tis little, very little, all 

That they can do between them. 

Few months of life has he in store 
As he to you will tell, 
For still, the more he works, the more 
Do his weak ankles swell. 
My gentle Reader, I perceive 
How patiently you've waited. 
And now I fear that you expect 
Some tale will be related. 

O Reader! had you in your mind 

Such stores as silent thought can bring, 

O gentle Reader! you would find 

A tale in every thing. 

What more I have to say is short, 

And you must kindly take it : 

It is no tale; but, should you think, 

Perhaps a tale you'll make it. 

One summer-day I chanced to see 
This old Man doing all he could 
To unearth the root of an old tree, 
A stump of rotten wood. 
The mattock totter'd in his hand; 
So vain was his endeavour 
That at the root of the old tree 
He might have work'd for ever. 

'You're overtask'd, good Simon Lee, 
Give me your tool,' to him I said; 



BOOK FOURTH 361 

And at the word right gladly he 

Received my proffer 'd aid. 

I struck, and with a single blow 

The tangled root I sever'd, 

At which the poor old man so long 

And vainly had endeavoured. 

The tears into his eyes were brought, 
And thanks and praises seem'd to run 
So fast out of his heart, I thought 
They never would have done. 
— I've heard of hearts unkind, kind deed 
With coldness still returning; 
Alas! the gratitude of men 
Hath oftener left me mourning. 

W. Wordsworth 

CCLXIV 

THE OLD FAMILIAR FACES 

I HAVE had playmates, I have had companions. 

In my days of childhood, in my joyful school-days: 

All, all are gone, the old familiar faces. 

I have been laughing, I have been carousing, 
Drinking late, sitting late, with my bosom cronies; 
All, all are gone, the old famihar faces. 

I loved a Love once, fairest among women: 
Closed are her doors on me, I must not see her — 
All, all are gone, the old familiar faces. 



362 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

I have a friend, a kinder friend has no man: 
Like an ingrate, I left my friend abruptly; 
Left him, to muse on the old familiar faces. 

Ghost-Hke I paced round the haunts of my childhood, 
Earth seem'd a desert I was bound to traverse. 
Seeking to find the old familiar faces. 

Friend of my bosom, thou more than a brother, 
Why wert not thou born in my father's dweUing? 
So might we talk of the old familiar faces. 

How some they have died, and some they have left me, 
And some are taken from me; all are departed; 
All, all are gone, the old famihar faces. 

C. Lamb 

CCLXV 
THE JOURNEY ONWARDS 

As slow our ship her foamy track 

Against the wind was cleaving. 
Her trembling pennant still look'd back 

To that dear isle 'twas leaving. 
So loth we part from all we love. 

From all the links that bind us; 
So turn our hearts, as on we rove. 

To those we've left behind us! 

When, round the bowl, of vanish'd years 
We talk with joyous seeming — 



BOOK FOURTH 363 

With smiles that might as well be tears, 

So faint, so sad their beaming; 
While memory brings us back again 

Each early tie that twined us, 
Oh, sweet's the cup that circles then 

To those we've left behind us! 

And when, in other climes, we meet 

Some isle or vale enchanting. 
Where all looks flowery, wild, and sweet, 

And nought but love is wanting; 
We think how great had been our bliss 

If Heaven had but assign'd us 
To live and die in scenes like this, 

With some we've left behind us! 

As travellers oft look back at eve 

When eastward darkly going, 
To gaze upon that Hght they leave 

Still faint behind them glowing, — 
So, when the close of pleasure's day 

To gloom hath near consign'd us, 
We turn to catch one fading ray 

Of joy that's left behind us. 

T. Moore 



364 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

CCLXVI 
YOUTH AND AGE 

There's not a joy the world can give like that it 

takes away 
When the glow of early thought declines in feeling's 

dull decay; 
'Tis not on youth's smooth cheek the blush alone, 

which fades so fast, 
But the tender bloom of heart is gone, ere youth 

itself be past. 

Then the few whose spirits float above the wreck of 

happiness 
Are driven o'er the shoals of guilt, or ocean of excess: 
The magnet of their course is gone, or only points in 

vain 
The shore to which their shiver'd sail shall never 

stretch again. 

Then the mortal coldness of the soul like death itself 

comes down; 
It cannot feel for others' woes, it dare not dream its 

own; 
That heavy chill has frozen o'er the fountain of our 

tears. 
And though the eye may sparkle still, 'tis where the 

ice appears. 

Though wit may flash from fluent lips, and mirth 
distract the breast, 



BOOK FOURTH 365 

Through midnight hours that yield no more their 

former hope of rest; 
'Tis but as ivy-leaves around the ruin'd turret wreathe, 
All green and wildly fresh without, but w^orn and 

gray beneath. 

Oh could I feel as I have felt, or be what I have been. 
Or weep as I could once have wept o'er many a vanish'd 

scene, — 
As springs in deserts found seem sweet, all brackish 

though they be, 
So midst the withered waste of life, those tears would 
flow to me! 

Lord Bijron 
CCLXVII 

A LESSON 

There is a Flower, the lesser Celandine, 
That shrinks hke many more from cold and rain. 
And the first moment that the sun may shine, 
Bright as the sun himself, 'tis out again! 

When hailstones have been falling, swarm on swarm, 
Or blasts the green field and the trees distrest, 
Oft have I seen it muffled up from harm 
In close self-shelter, like a thing at rest. 

But lately, one rough day, this Flower I past, 
And recognized it, though an alter'd form, 
Now standing forth an offering to the blast, 
And buffeted at will by rain and storm. 



366 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

I stopp'd and said, with inly-mutter'd voice, 
'It doth not love the shower, nor seek the cold; 
This neither is its courage nor its choice, 
But its necessity in being old. 

'The sunshine may not cheer it, nor the dew; 
It cannot help itself in its decay; 
Stiff in its members, wither'd, changed of hue,' — 
And, in my spleen, I smiled that it was gray. 

To be a prodigal's favourite — then, worse truth, 
A miser's pensioner — behold our lot! 
O Man! that from thy fair and shining youth 
Age might but take the things Youth needed not! 

W. Wordsworth 

CCLXVIII 

PAST AND PRESENT 

I REMEMBER, I remember 
The house where I was born, 
The little window where the sun 
Came peeping in at morn; 
He never came a wink too soon 
Nor brought too long a day; 
But now, I often wish the night 
Had borne my breath away. 

I remember, I remember 
The roses, red and white, 
The violets, and the lily-cups — 



BOOK FOURTH 367 

Those flowers made of light! 
The hlacs where the robin built, 
And where my brother set 
The laburnum on his birth-day, — 
The tree is living yet! 

I remember, I remember 

Where I was used to swing, 

And thought the air must rush as fresh 

To swallows on the wing; 

My spirit flew in feathers then 

That is so heavy now. 

And summer pools could hardly cool 

The fever on my brow. 

I remember, I remember 

The fir trees dark and high; 

I used to think their slender tops 

Were close against the sky: 

It was a childish ignorance, 

But now 'tis little joy 

To know I'm farther off from Heaven 

Than when I was a boy. 

T, Hood 

CCLXIX 

THE LIGHT OF OTHER DAYS 

Oft in the stilly night 

Ere slumber's chain has bound me, 
Fond Memory brings the light 



368 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Of other days around me: 

The smiles, the tears 

Of boyhood's years, 
The words of love then spoken; 

The eyes that shone. 

Now dimm'd and gone. 
The cheerful hearts now broken! 
Thus in the stilly night 

Ere slumber's chain has bound me, 
Sad Memory brings the light 
Of other days around me. 

When I remember all 

The friends so link'd together 
I've seen around me fall 

Like leaves in wintry weather, 
I feel like one 
Who treads alone 
Some banquet-hall deserted, 
Whose lights are fled 
Whose garlands dead. 
And all but he departed! 
Thus in the stilly night 

Ere slumber's chain has bound me, 
Sad Memory brings the light 
Of other days around me. 

T. Moore 



BOOK FOURTH 369 



CCLXX 



STANZAS WRITTEN IN DEJECTION NEAR 
NAPLES 

The sun is warm, the sky is clear, 
The waves are dancing fast and bright, 
Blue isles and snowy mountains wear 
' The purple noon's transparent might: 
The breath of the moist earth is light 
Around its unexpanded buds; 
Like many a voice of one delight — 
The winds', the birds', the ocean-floods' — 
The city's voice itself is soft hke Solitude's. 

I see the deep's untrampled floor 
With green and purple sea-weeds strown; 
I see the waves upon the shore 
Like Hght dissolved in star-showers thrown: 
I sit upon the sands alone; 
The lightning of the noon-tide ocean 
Is flashing round me, and a tone 
Arises from its measured motion — 
How sweet ! did any heart now share in my emotion. 

Alas! I have nor hope nor health, 

Nor peace within nor calm around, 

Nor that content, surpassing wealth. 

The sage in meditation found, 

And walk'd with inward glory crown'd — 

Nor fame, nor power, nor love, nor leisure; 



370 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Others I see whom these surround — 
Smiling they live, and call life pleasure; 
To me that cup has been dealt in another measure. 

Yet now despair itself is mild 
Even as the winds and waters are; 
I could lie down like a tired child, 
And weep away the life of care 
Which I have borne, and yet must bear, — 
Till death like sleep might steal on me, 
And I might feel in the warm air 
My cheek grow cold, and hear the sea 
Breathe o'er my dying brain its last monotony. 

P. B. Shelley 

CCLXXI 

THE SCHOLAR 

My days among the Dead are past; 

Around me I behold, 

Where'er these casual eyes are cast, 

The mighty minds of old : 

My never-failing friends are they. 

With whom I converse day by day. 

With them I take delight in weal 

And seek relief in woe; 

And while I understand and feel 

How much to them I owe. 

My cheeks have often been bedew'd 

With tears of thoughtful gratitude. 



BOOK FOURTH 371 

My thoughts are with the Dead; with them 

I Uve in long-past years, 

Their virtues love, their faults condemn, 

Partake their hopes and fears, 

And from their lessons seek and find 

Instruction with an humble mind. 

My hopes are with the Dead; anon 
My place with them will be. 
And I with them shall travel on 
Through all Futurity; 
Yet leaving here a name, I trust. 
That will not perish in the dust. 

R. Southey 



CCLXXII 

THE MERMAID TAVERN 

Souls of Poets dead and gone, 
What Elysium have ye known, 
Happy field or mossy cavern. 
Choicer than the Mermaid Tavern? 
Have ye tippled drink more fine 
Than mine host's Canary wine? 
Or are fruits of Paradise 
Sweeter than those dainty pies 
Of venison? generous food! 
Drest as though bold Robin Hood 
Would, with his Maid Marian, 
Sup and bowse from horn and can. 



372 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

I have heard that on a day 
Mine host's sign-board flew away 
Nobody knew whither, till 
An astrologer's old quill 
To a sheepskin gave the story, 
Said he saw you in your glory, 
Underneath a new-old sign 
Sipping beverage divine, 
And pledging with contented smack 
The Mermaid in the Zodiac. 

Souls of Poets dead and gone, 
What Elysium have ye known, 
Happy field or mossy cavern, 
Choicer than the Mermaid Tavern? 

J. Keats 

CCLXXIII 
THE PRIDE OF YOUTH 

Proud Maisie is in the wood. 

Walking so early; 
Sweet Robin sits on the bush, 

Singing so rarely. 

' Tell me, thou bonny bird. 
When shall I marry me? ' 

— ' When six braw gentlemen 
Kirkward shall carry ye.' 

'Who makes the bridal bed. 
Birdie say truly? ' 



BOOK FOURTH 373 

— 'The gray-headed sexton 
That delves the grave duly. 

'The glowworm o'er grave and stone 

Shall light thee steady; 
The owl from the steeple sing 

Welcome, proud lady.' 

Sir W. Scott 

CCLXXIV 

THE BRIDGE OF SIGHS 

One more Unfortunate 
Weary of breath 
Rashly importunate, 
Gone to her death ! 
Take her up tenderly. 
Lift her with care; 
Fashion'd so slenderly, 
Young, and so fair! 

Look at her garments 
Clinging like cerements; 
Whilst the wave constantly 
Drips from her clothing; 
Take her up instantly. 
Loving, not loathing. 

Touch her not scornfully. 
Think of her mournfully. 
Gently and humanly; 
Not of the stains of her — 



374 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

All that remains of her 
Now is pure womanly. 

Make no deep scrutiny 
Into her mutiny 
Rash and undutiful: 
Past all dishonour, 
Death has left on her 
Only the beautiful. 

Still, for all slips of hers, 
One of Eve's family — 
Wipe those poor lips of hers 
Oozing so clammily. 

Loop up her tresses 
Escaped from the comb. 
Her fair auburn tresses; 
Whilst wonderment guesses 
Where was her home? 

Who was her father? 
Who was her mother? 
Had she a sister? 
Had she a brother? 
Or was there a dearer one 
Still, and a nearer one 
Yet, than all other? 

Alas! for the rarity 
Of Christian charity 
Under the sun! 



BOOK FOURTH 375 

Oh ! it was pitiful ! 
Near a whole city full, 
Home she had none. 

Sisterly, brotherly, 
Fatherly, motherly 
Feelings had changed : 
Love, by harsh evidence. 
Thrown from its eminence; 
Even God's providence 
Seeming estranged. 

Where the lamps quiver 

So far in the river, 

With many a light 

From window and casement, 

From garret to basement. 

She stood with amazement. 

Houseless by night. 

The bleak wind of March 
Made her tremble and shiver 
But not the dark arch. 
Or the black flowing river: 
Mad from life's history. 
Glad to death's mystery 
Swift to be hurl'd — 
Any where, any where 
Out of the world! 

In she plunged boldly. 
No matter how coldly 



376 77//-; aOLDKX TREASl'in' 

Tho rouiih rivor ran, — 
Ch'or tho brink oi it, 
rii'turo it - think o{ it, 
Dissohito Man! 
Lavo in it, drink of it, 
TliiMi. if you I'an! 

Take hor up tonilorly, 
Lift luM" with I'art^: 
Fashion'd so skMidiM-ly, 
Younu;. and so fair! 

Ero her Hnihs frigidly 
StitTon too riiiidly, 
l^c\'ontl>-. kindly, 
Smooth and compose thorn, 
And hor oyos, oloso thorn, 
Staring so blindly! 

Droiidfully staring 
Thro* muddy im]nn'ity, 
As whon with tho daring 
L:ii>t U)ok of despairing 
Fix'd on futurity. 

Porisliing gloomily, 

Spurr'd by eontumol}', 

Cold inhumanity. 

Burning insanity. 

Into her rest. 

— Cross her hands humbly 



BfjOK FOURTH 377 

As if praying dumbly, 
Over her ?jreast! 

Owning her weakness, 
Her evil behaviour. 
And leaving, with meekness, 
Her sias to her Saviour. 

T, Hood 

CCLXXV 

ELEGY 

Oh snatch'd away in beauty's bloom! 
On thee shall press no ponderous tomb; 
But on thy turf shall roses rear 
Their leaves, the earliest of the year. 
And the wild cypress wave in tender gloom: 

And oft by yon blue gushing stream 
Shall Sorrow lean her drooping head, 
And feed deep thought with many a dream. 
And lingering pause and lightly tread; 
Fond wretch! as if her step disturb'd the dead! 

Away! we know that tears are vain. 
That Death nor heeds nor hears distress: 
Will this unteach us to complain? 
Or make one mourner weep the less? 
And thou, who tell'st me to forget. 
Thy looks are wan, thine eyes are wet. 

Lord Byron 



378 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

CCLXXVI 

HESTER 

When maidens such as Hester die 
Their place ye may not well supply, 
Though ye among a thousand try 

With vain endeavour. 
A month or more hath she been dead, 
Yet cannot I by force be led 
To think upon the wormy bed 

And her together. 

A springy motion in her gait, 

A rising step, did indicate 

Of pride and joy no common rate 

That flush'd her spirit: 
I know not by what name beside 
I shall it call: if 'twas not pride. 
It was a joy to that allied 

She did inherit. 

Her parents held the Quaker rule, 
Which doth the human feeling cool; 
But she was train'd in Nature's school, 

Nature had blest her. 
A waking eye, a prying mind, 
A heart that stirs, is hard to bind; 
A hawk's keen sight ye cannot blind, 

Ye could not Hester. 

My sprightly neighbour! gone before 
To that unknown and silent shore. 



BOOK FOURTH 379 

Shall we not meet, as heretofore 

Some summer morning — 

When from thy cheerful eyes a ray 

Hath struck a bliss upon the day, 

A bliss that would not go away, 
A sweet fore-warning? 

C. Lamb 

CCLXXVII 
TO MARY 

If I had thought thou couldst have died, 

I might not weep for thee; 
But I forgot, when by thy side, 

That thou couldst mortal be: 
It never through my mind had past 

The time would e'er be o'er. 
And I on thee should look my last, 

And thou shouldst smile no more! 

And still upon that face I look, 

And think 'twill smile again; 
And still the thought I will not brook 

That I must look in vain! 
But when I speak — thou dost not say 

What thou ne'er left'st unsaid; 
And now I feel, as well I may. 

Sweet Mary! thou art dead! 

If thou wouldst stay, e'en as thou art, 
All cold and all serene — 



380 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

I still might press th}^ silent heart, 
And where thy smiles have been. 

While e'en thy chill, bleak corse I have, 
Thou seemest still mine own; 

But there I laj' thee in thy grave — 
And I am now alone! 

I do not think, where'er thou art, 

Thou hast forgotten me; 
And I, perhaps, may soothe this heart. 

In thinking too of thee: 
Yet there was round thee such a dawn 

Of light ne'er seen before. 
As fancy never could have drawn, 

And never can restore! 

C. Wolfe 

CCLXXVIII 
CORONACH 

He is gone on the mountain. 

He is lost to the forest, 
Like a summer-dried fountain. 

When our need was the sorest. 
The font reappearing 

From the raindrops shall borrow, 
But to us comes no cheering, 

To Duncan no morrow! 

The hand of the reaper 

Takes the ears that are hoary, 



book: fourth 38 1 

But the voice of the weeper 

Wails manhood in glory. 
The autumn winds rushing 

Waft the leaves that are searest, 
But our flower was in flushing 

When blighting was nearest. 

Fleet foot on the correi, 

Sage counsel in cumber, 
Red hand in the foray, 

How sound is thy slumber! 
Like the dew on the mountain. 

Like the foam on the river, 
Like the bubble on the fountain, 

Thou art gone; and for ever! 

Sir W. Scott 

CCLXXIX 
THE DEATH BED 

We watch'd her breathing thro' the night. 

Her breathing soft and low. 
As in her breast the wave of Hfe 

Kept heaving to and fro. 

So silently we seem'd to speak, 

So slowly moved about, 
As we had lent her half our powers 

To eke her living out. 

Our very hopes belied our fears, 
Our fears our hopes belied — 



382 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

We thought her djnng when she slept, 
And sleeping when she died. 

For when the morn came dim and sad 
And chill ^^'ith early showers, 

Her quiet eyehds closed — she had 
Another morn than ours. 

T. Hood 

CCLXXX 
AGNES 

I SAW her in childhood — 

A bright, gentle thing. 
Like the dawn of the morn. 

Or the dews of the spring: 
The daisies and hare-bells 

Her playmates all day; 
Herself as light-hearted 

And artless as they. 

I saw her again — 

A fair girl of eighteen. 
Fresh glittering ^\dth graces 

Of mind and of mien. 
Her speech was all music; 

Like moonlight she shone; 
The envy of many. 

The glory of one. 

Years, years fleeted over — 
I stood at her foot: 



BOOK FOURTH 383 

The bud had grown blossom, 

The blossom was fruit. 
A dignified mother, 

Her infant she bore; 
And look'd, I thought, fairer 

Than ever before. 

I saw her once more — 

'Twas the day that she died; 
Heaven's fight was around her, 

And God at her side; 
No wants to distress her, 

No fears to appal — 
O then, I felt, then 

She was fairest of ah! 

H. F. Lyte 

CCLXXXI 
ROSABELLE 

LISTEN, fist en, ladies gay! 

No haughty feat of arms I tell; 
Soft is the note, and sad the lay 

That mourns the lovely Rosabelle. 

'Moor, moor the barge, ye gafiant crew! 

And, gentle ladye, deign to stay! 
Rest thee in Castle Ravensheuch, 

Nor tempt the stormy firth to-day. 

'The blackening wave is edged with white; 
To inch and rock the sea-mews fly; 



384 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

The fishers have heard the Water-Sprite, 
Whose screams forebode that wreck is nigh. 

'Last night the gifted Seer did view 
A wet shroud swathed round ladye gay; 

Then stay thee, Fair, in Ravensheuch; 
Why cross the gloomy firth to-day? ' 

' 'Tis not because Lord Lindesay's lieir 
To-night at RosUn leads the ball. 

But that my ladye-mother there 
Sits lonely in her castle-hall. 

' 'Tis not because the ring they ride, 
And Lindesay at the ring rides well, 

But that my sire the wine will chide 
If 'tis not fiird by Rosabelle.' 

— O'er Roslin all that dreary night 
A wondrous blaze was seen to gleam; 

'Twas broader than the watch-fire's light. 
And redder than the bright moonbeam. 

It glared on Roslin's castled rock, 
It ruddied all the copse-wood glen; 

'Twas seen from Dryden's groves of oak, 
And seen from cavern'd Hawthornden. 

Seem'd all on fire that chapel proud 
Where Roslin's chiefs uncoffin'd lie, 

Each Baron, for a sable shroud. 
Sheathed in his iron panoply. 



BOOK FOURTH 385 

Seem'd all on fire within, around, 

Deep sacristy and altar's pale; 
Shone every pillar foliage-bound, 

And glimmer'd all the dead men's mail. 

Blazed battlement and pinnet high, 

Blazed every rose-carved buttress fair — 
So still they blaze, when fate is nigh 
, The lordly line of high Saint Clair. 

There are twenty of Roslin's barons bold — 
Lie buried within that proud chapelle; 

Each one the holy vault doth hold — 
But the sea holds lovely Rosabelle. 

And each Saint Clair was buried there. 
With candle, with book, and with knell; 

But the sea-caves rung, and the wild winds sung 
The dirge of lovely Rosabelle. 

Sir W. Scott 

CCLXXXII 

ON AN INFANT DYING AS SOON AS BORN 

I SAW wherein the shroud did lurk 

A curious frame of Nature's work; 

A flow'ret crushed in the bud, 

A nameless piece of Babyhood, 

Was in her cradle-coffin lying; 

Extinct, with scarce the sense of dying: 

So soon to exchange the imprisoning womb 



386 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

For darker closets of the tomb! 

She did but ope an eye, and put 

A clear beam forth, then straight up shut 

For the long dark: ne'er more to see 

Through glasses of mortality. 

Riddle of destiny, who can show 

What thy short visit meant, or know 

What thy errand here below? 

Shall we say, that Nature blind 

Check'd her hand, and changed her mind 

Just when she had exactly wrought 

A finished pattern without fault? 

Could she flag, or could she tire, 

Or lack'd she the Promethean fire 

(With her nine moons' long workings sicken'd) 

That should thy little limbs have quicken'd? 

Limbs so firm, they seem'd to assure 

Life of health, and days mature: 

Woman's self in miniature! 

Limbs so fair, they might supply 

(Themselves now but cold imagery) 

The sculptor to make Beauty by. 

Or did the stern-eyed Fate descry 

That babe or mother, one must die; 

So in mercy left the stock 

And cut the branch; to save the shock 

Of young years widow'd, and the pain 

When Single State comes back again 

To the lone man who, reft of wife, 

Thenceforward drags a maimed life? 

The economy of Heaven is dark, 



BOOK FOURTH 387 

And wisest clerks have miss'd the mark 

Why human buds, Hke this, should fall, 

More brief than fly ephemeral 

That has his day; while shrivell'd crones 

Stiffen with age to stocks and stones; 

And crabbed use the conscience sears 

In sinners of an hundred years. 

— Mother's prattle, mother's kiss, 

Baby fond, thou ne'er wilt miss: 

Rites, which custom does impose, 

Silver bells, and baby clothes; 

Coral redder than those lips 

Which pale death did late eclipse; 

Music framed for infants' glee. 

Whistle never tuned for thee; 

Though thou want'st not, thou shalt have them. 

Loving hearts were they which gave them. 

Let not one be missing; nurse, 

See them laid upon the hearse 

Of infant slain by doom perverse. 

Why should kings and nobles have 

Pictured trophies to their grave, 

And we, churls, to thee deny 

Thy pretty toys with thee to lie — 

A more harmless vanity? 

C. Lamb 



388 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

CCLXXXIII 
IN MEMORIAM 

A child's a plaything for an hour; 

Its pretty tricks we try 
For that or for a longer space, — 

Then tire, and lay it by. 

But I knew one that to itself 

All seasons could control; 
That would have mock'd the sense of pain 

Out of a grieved soul. 

Thou straggler into loving arms, 

Young climber up of knees, 
When I forget thy thousand ways 

Then life and all shall cease! 

M, Lamb 

CCLXXXIV 

THE AFFLICTION OF MARGARET 

Where art thou, my beloved Son, 
Where art thou, worse to me than dead? 
Oh find me, prosperous or undone! 
Or if the grave be now thy bed. 
Why am I ignorant of the same 
That I may rest; and neither blame 
Nor sorrow may attend thy name? 



BOOK FOURTH 389 

Seven years, alas! to have received 
No tidings of an only child — 
To have despair'd, have hoped, beHeved, 
And been for ever more beguiled, — 
Sometimes with thoughts of very bliss! 
I catch at them, and then I miss; 
Was ever darkness like to this? 

He was among the prime in worth, 
An object beauteous to behold; 
Well born, well bred; I sent him forth 
Ingenuous, innocent, and bold: 
If things ensued that wanted grace 
As hath been said, they were not base; 
And never blush was on my face. 

Ah! little doth the young-one dream 
When full of play and childish cares. 
What power is in his wildest scream 
Heard by his mother unawares! 
He knows it not, he cannot guess; 
Years to a mother bring distress; 
But do not make her love the less. 

Neglect me! no, I suffered long 
From that ill thought; and being blind 
Said 'Pride shall help me in my wrong: 
Kind mother have I been, as kind 
As ever breathed : ' and that is true; 
I've wet my path with tears like dew, 
Weeping for him when no one knew. 



390 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

My Son, if thou be humbled, poor, 
Hopeless of honour and of gain. 
Oh! do not dread thy mother's door; 
Think not of me with grief and pain: 
I now can see with better eyes; 
And worldly grandeur I despise 
And fortune with her gifts and lies. 

Alas! the fowls of heaven have wings, 
And blasts of heaven will aid their flight; 
They mount — how short a voyage brings 
The wanderers back to their delight! 
Chains tie us down by land and sea; 
And wishes, vain as mine, may be 
All that is left to comfort thee. 

Perhaps some dungeon hears thee groan 
Maim'd, mangled by inhuman men; 
Or thou upon a desert thrown 
Inheritest the hon's den; 
Or hast been summon'd to the deep 
Thou, thou, and all thy mates to keep 
An incommunicable sleep. 

I look for ghosts: but none will force 
Their way to me; 'tis falsely said 
That there was ever intercourse 
Between the living and the dead; 
For surely then I should have sight 
Of him I wait for day and night 
With love and longings infinite. 



BOOK FOURTH 391 

My apprehensions come in crowds; 
I dread the rustling of the grass; 
The very shadows of the clouds 
Have power to shake me as they pass: 
I question things, and do not find 
One that will answer to my n ind; 
And all the world appears unkind. 

Beyond participation lie 
My troubles, and beyond relief: 
If any chance to heave a sigh 
They pity me, and not my grief. 
Then come to me, my Son, or send 
Some tidings that my woes may end! 
I have no other earthly friend. 

W. Wordsworth 

CCLXXXV 

HUNTING SONG 

Waken, lords and ladies gay, 

On the mountain dawns the day; 

All the jolly chase is here 

With hawk and horse and hunting-spear; 

Hounds are in their couples yelling, 

Hawks are whistling, horns are knelling, 

Merrily merrily mingle they, 

' Waken, lords and ladies gay.' 

Waken, lords and ladies gay. 

The mist has left the mountain gray, 



392 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Springlets in the dawn are steaming, 

Diamonds on the brake are gleaming; 

And foresters have busy been 

To track the buck in thicket green; 

Now we come to chant our lay 

* Waken, lords and ladies gay/ 

Waken, lords and ladies gay, 
To the greenwood haste away; 
We can show you where he lies, 
Fleet of foot and tall of size; 
We can show the marks he made 
When 'gainst the oak his antlers fray'd; 
You shall see him brought to bay; 
'Waken, lords and ladies gay.' 

Louder, louder chant the lay 

Waken, lords and ladies gay! 

Tell them youth and mirth and glee 

Run a course as well as we; 

Time, stern huntsman! who can baulk, 

Stanch as hound and fleet as hawk; 

Think of this, and rise with day. 

Gentle lords and ladies gay! 

Sir W. Scott 

CCLXXXVI 

TO THE SKYLARK 

Ethereal minstrel! pilgrim of the sky! 

Dost thou despise the earth where cares abound? 



BOOK FOURTH 393 

Or while the wings aspire, are heart and eye 
Both with thy nest upon the dewy ground? 
Thy nest which thou canst drop into at will, 
Those quivering wings composed, that music still! 

To the last point of vision, and beyond 

Mount, daring warbler ! — that love-prompted strain 

— 'Twixt thee and thine a never-failing bond — 

Thrills not the less the bosom of the plain : 

Yet might'st thou seem, proud privilege! to sing 

All independent of the leafy Spring. 

Leave to the nightingale her shady wood; 

A privacy of glorious light is thine. 

Whence thou dost pour upon the world a flood 

Of harmony, with instinct more divine; 

Type of the wise, who soar, but never roam — 

True to the kindred points of Heaven and Home. 

W. Wordsworth 

CCLXXXVII 
• TO A SKYLARK 

Hail to thee, blithe Spirit! 

Bird thou never wert, 
That from heaven, or near it 

Pourest thy full heart 
In profuse strains of unpremeditated art 

Higher still and higher 

From the earth thou springest, 



394 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Like a cloud of fire, 
The blue deep thou wingest, 
And singing still dost soar, and soaring ever singest. 

In the golden lightning 

Of the sunken sun 
O'er which clouds are brightening, 
Thou dost float and run. 
Like an unbodied joy whose race is just begun. 

The pale purple even 

Melts around thy flight; 
Like a star of heaven 

In the broad daylight 
Thou art unseen, but yet I hear thy shrill delight: 

Keen as are the arrows 

Of that silver sphere. 
Whose intense lamp narrows 

In the white dawn clear 
Until we hardly see, we feel that it is there. 

All the earth and air 

With thy voice is loud, 
As, when night is bare. 
From one lonely cloud 
The moon rains out her beams, and heaven is over- 
flowed. 

What thou art we know not; 
What is most like thee? 



BOOK FOURTH 395 

From rainbow clouds there flow not 
Drops so bright to see 
As from thy presence showers a rain of melody; — 

Like a poet hidden 

In the light of thought, 
Singing hymns unbidden, 

Till the world is wrought 
To sympathy with hopes and fears it heeded not: 

Like a high-born maiden 

In a palace tower, 
Soothing her love-laden 
Soul in secret hour 
With music sweet as love, which overflows her bower: 

Like a glow-worm golden 

In a dell of dew, 
Scattering unbeholden 
Its aerial hue 
Among the flowers and grass, which screen it from the 
view: 

Like a rose embower'd 

In its own green leaves, 
By warm winds deflower'd, 
Till the scent it gives 
Makes faint with too nmch sweet these heavy-winged 
thieves. 

Sound of vernal showers 
On the twinkling grass, 



396 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Rain-awaken'd flowers, 
All that ever was 
Joyous, and clear, and fresh, thy music doth surpass. 

Teach us, sprite or bird. 

What sweet thoughts are thine: 
I have never heard 

Praise of love or wine 
That panted forth a flood of rapture so divine. 

Chorus hymeneal 

Or triumphal chaunt 
Match'd with thine, would be all 

But an empty vaunt — 
A thing wherein we feel there is some hidden want. 

What objects are the fountains 

Of thy happy strain? 
What fields, or waves, or mountains? 

What shapes of sky or plain? 
What love of thine own kind? what ignorance of pain? 

With thy clear keen joyance 

Languor cannot be: 
Shadow of annoyance 

Never came near thee: 
Thou lovest; but ne'er knew love's sad satiety. 

Waking or asleep 

Thou of death must deem 
Things more true and deep 



BOOK FOURTH 397 

Than we mortals dream, 
Or how could thy notes flow in such a crystal stream? 

We look before and after, 

And pine for what is not: 
Our sincerest laughter 

With some pain is fraught; 
Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest 
thought. 

Yet if we could scorn 

Hate, and pride, and fear; 
If we were things born 
Not to shed a tear, 
I know not how thy joy we ever should come near. 

Better than all measures 

Of delightful sound, 
Better than all treasures 

That in books are found. 
Thy skill to poet were, thou scorner of the ground! 

Teach me half the gladness 

That thy brain must know, 
Such harmonious madness 
From my lips would flow, 
The world should listen then, as I am listening now! 

P. B. Shelley 



398 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

CCLXXXVIII 

THE GREEN LINNET 

Beneath these fruit-tree boughs that shed 
Their snow-white blossoms on my head, 
With brightest sunshine round me spread 
Of Spring's unclouded weather, 
In this sequester'd nook how sweet 
To sit upon my orchard-seat! 
And flowers and birds once more to greet, 
My last year's friends together. 

One have I mark'd, the happiest guest 
In all this covert of the l)lest: 
Hail to Thee, far above the rest 
In joy of voice and pinion! 
Thou, Linnet! in thy green array 
Presiding Spirit here to-day 
Dost lead the revels of the May; 
And this is thy dominion. 

While birds, and butterflies, and flowers, 
Make all one band of paramours. 
Thou, ranging up and down the bowers. 
Art sole in thy employment; 
A Life, a Presence like the air. 
Scattering thy gladness without care, 
Too blest with any one to pair; 
Thyself thy own enjoyment. 

Amid yon tuft of hazel trees 
That twinkle to the gusty breeze, 



BOOK FOURTH 399 

Behold him perch'd in ecstasies 
Yet seeming still to hover; 
There! where the flutter of his wings 
Upon his back and body flings 
Shadows and sunny glimmerings, 
That cover him all over. 

My dazzled sight he oft deceives — 
A brother of the dancing leaves; 
Then flits, and from the cottage-eaves 
Pours forth his song in gushes; 
As if by that exulting strain 
He mock'd and treated with disdain 
The voiceless Form he chose to feign, 
While fluttering in the bushes. 

W. Wordsworth 

CCLXXXIX 
TO THE CUCKOO 

BLITHE new-comer! I have heard, 

1 hear thee and rejoice: 

O Cuckoo! shall I call thee Bird, 
Or but a wandering Voice? 

While I am lying on the grass 
Thy twofold shout I hear; 
From hill to hill it seems to pass. 
At once far off and near. 

Though babbling only to the vale 
Of sunshine and of flowers, 



400 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Thou bringest unto me a tale 
Of visionary hours. 

Thrice welcome, darling of the Spring! 

Even yet thou art to me 

No bird, but an invisible thing, 

A voice, a mystery; 

The same whom in my school-boy days 
I Hsten'd to; that Cry 
Which made me look a thousand ways 
In bush, and tree, and sky. 

To seek thee did I often rove 
Through woods and on the green; 
And thou wert still a hope, a love; 
Still long'd for, never seen! 

And I can listen to thee yet; 
Can lie upon the plain 
And listen, till I do beget 
That golden time again. 

O blessed Bird ! the earth we pace 
Again appears to be 
An unsubstantial, faery place, 
That is fit home for Thee! 

W. Wordsworth 



BOOK FOURTH 401 

CCXC 

ODE TO A NIGHTINGALE 

My heart aches, and a drowsy numbness pains 
My sense, as though of hemlock I had drunk, 
Or emptied some dull opiate to the drains 

One minute past, and Lethe-wards had sunk: 
'Tis not through envy of thy happy lot, 
But being too happy in thine happiness, — 
That thou, light-winged Dryad of the trees, 
In some melodious plot 
Of beechen green, and shadows numberless, 
Singest of summer in full-throated ease. 

O, for a draught of vintage! that hath been 

Cool'd a long age in the deep-delved earth. 
Tasting of Flora and the country green, 

Dance, and Provengal song, and sunburnt mirth ! 
O for a beaker full of the warm South, 

Full of the true, the blushful Hippocrene, 
With beaded bubbles winking at the brim, 
And purple-stained mouth; 
That I might drink, and leave the world unseen. 

And with thee fade away into the forest dim : 

Fade far away, dissolve, and quite forget 
What thou among the leaves hast never knowTi, 

The weariness, the fever, and the fret 

Here, where men sit and hear each other groan; 

Where palsy shakes a few, sad, last gra}' hairs. 

Where youth grows pale, and spectre-thin, and dies; 



402 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Where but to think is to be full of sorrow 
And leaden-eyed despairs; 
Where Beauty cannot keep her lustrous eyes, 
Or new Love pine at them beyond to-morrow. 

Away! away! for I will fly to thee, 

Not charioted by Bacchus and his pards. 
But on the viewless wings of Poesy, 

Though the dull brain perplexes and retards: 
Already with thee ! tender is the night. 

And haply the Queen-Moon is on her throne, 
Cluster'd around by all her starry Fays; 
But here there is no light. 
Save what from heaven is with the breezes blown 
Through verdurous glooms and winding mossy 
ways. 

I cannot see what flowers are at my feet, 

Nor what soft incense hangs upon the boughs, 
But, in embalmed darkness, guess each sweet 

Wherewith the seasonable month endows 
The grass, the thicket, and the fruit-tree wild; 
White hawthorn, and the pastoral eglantine; 
Fast fading violets cover'd up in leaves; 
And mid-May's eldest child. 
The coming musk-rose, full of dewy wine. 

The muruiurous haunt of flies on summer eves. 

Darkling I listen; and for many a time 

I have been half in love with easeful Death, 
Call'd him soft names in many a mused rhyme, 



BOOK FOURTH 403 

To take into the air my quiet breath; 
Now more than ever seems it rich to die, 
To cease upon the midnight with no pain, 
While thou art pouring forth thy soul abroad 
In such an ecstasy! 
Still wouldst thou sing, and I have ears in vain — 
To thy high requiem become a sod. 

Thou wast not born for death, immortal Bird! 

No hungry generations tread thee down; 
The voice I hear this passing night was heard 

In ancient days by emperor and clown: 
Perhaps the self-same song that found a path 

Through the sad heart of Ruth, when, sick for home, 
She stood in tears amid the alien corn; 
The same that oft-times hath 
Charm'd magic casements, opening on the foam 
Of perilous seas, in faery lands forlorn. 

Forlorn ! the very word is like a bell 

To toll me back from thee to my sole self I 
Adieu! the fancy cannot cheat so well 
As she is famed to do, deceiving elf. 
Adieu! adieu! thy plaintive anthem fades 
Past the near meadows, over the still stream, 
Up the hill-side; and now 'tis buried deep 
In the next valley-glades: 
Was it a vision, or a waking dream? 

Fled is that music : — Do I wake or sleep? 

J. Keats 



404 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

CCXCI 

UPON WESTMINSTER BRIDGE 
SEPT. 3, 1802 ^ 

Earth has not anything to show more fair: 
' Dull would he be of soul who could pass by 
A sight so touching in its majesty: 
This City now doth like a garment wear 

The beauty of the morning: silent, bare, 
Ships, towers, domes, theatres, and temples lie 
Open unto the fields, and to the sky, — 
All bright and glittering in the smokeless air. 

Never did sun more beautifully steep 
In his first splendour valley, rock, or hill; 
Ne'er saw I, never felt, a calm so deep! 

The river glideth at its own sweet will : 
Dear God! the very houses seem asleep; 
And all that mighty heart is lying still! 

W. Wordsworth 



>:^ 



CCXCII 

To one who has been long in city pent, 

'Tis very sweet to look into the fair 

And op^ {^<7e >pf -heaven, — to breathe a prayer J 

Full in the smile of the blue firmament. -' '' "« 

Who is more happy, when, with heart's content, 
Fatigued he sinks into some pleasant lair 



BOOK FOURTH 405 

Of wavy grass, and reads a debonair 
And gentle tale of love and languishment? 

Returning home at evening, with an ear 
Catching the notes of Philomel, — an eye 
Watching the sailing cloudlet's bright career, 

yvvv 

He mourns that day so soon has glided by; 
E'en like the passage of an angel's tear 
That falls through the clear ether silently. 

J. Keats 

CCXCIII 

OZYMANDIAS OF EGYPT 

I MET a traveller from an antique land 
Who said : Two vast and trunkless legs of stone 
Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand, 
Half sunk, a shatter'd visage lies, whose frown 
And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command 
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read 
Which yet survive, stamp'd on these lifeless things, 
The hand that mock'd them and the heart that fed; 
And on the pedestal these words appear: 
'My name is Ozymandias, king of kings: 
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!^ 
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay 
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare, 
The lone and level sands stretch far away. 

P. B. Shelley 



406 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

CCXCIV 

COMPOSED AT NEIDPATH CASTLE, THE 

PROPERTY OF LORD QUEENSBERRY 

1803 

Degenerate Douglas ! oh, the unworthy lord ! 
Whom mere despite of heart could so far please 
And love of havoc, (for with such disease 
Fame taxes him,) that he could send forth word 

To level with the dust a noble horde, 

A brotherhood of venerable trees. 

Leaving an ancient dome, and towers like these, 

Beggar'd and outraged! — Many hearts deplored 

The fate of those old trees; and oft with pain 

The traveller at this day will stop and gaze 

On wrongs, which Nature scarcely seems to heed: 

For shelter'd places, bosoms, nooks, and bays, 
And the pure mountains, and the gentle Tweed; 
And the green silent pastures, yet remain. 

W. Wordsworth 

CCXCV 

THE BEECH TREE'S PETITION 

LEAVE this barren spot to me! 

Spare, woodman, spare the beechen tree! 

Though bush or floweret never grow 



BOOK FOURTH 407 

My dark unwarming shade below; 
Nor summer bud perfume the dew 
Of rosy blush, or yellow hue; 
Nor fruits of autumn, blossom-born, 
My green and glossy leaves adorn; 
Nor murmuring tribes from me derive 
Th' ambrosial amber of the hive; 
Yet leave this barren spot to me: 
Spare, woodman, spare the beechen tree! 

Thrice twenty summers I have seen 
The sky grow bright, the forest green; 
And many a wintry wind have stood 
In bloomless, fruitless solitude. 
Since childhood in my pleasant bower 
First spent its sweet and sportive hour; 
Since youthful lovers in my shade 
Their vows of truth and rapture made, 
And on my trunk's surviving frame 
Carved many a long-forgotten name. 
Oh! by the sighs of gentle sound, 
First breathed upon this sacred ground; 
By all that Love has whisper'd here, 
Or Beauty heard with ravish'd ear; 
As Love's own altar honour me: 
Spare, woodman, spare the beechen tree! 

r. Campbell 



408 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

CCXCVI 
ADMONITION TO A TRAVELLER 

Yes, there is holy pleasure in thine eye! 

— The lovely Cottage in the guardian nook 
Hath stirr'd thee deeply; with its own dear brook, 
Its own small pasture, almost its own sky! 

But covet not the abode; forbear to sigh 
As many do, repining while they look; 
Intruders — who would tear from Nature's book 
This precious leaf with harsh impiety. 

— Think what the home must be if it were thine, 
Even thine, though few thy wants ! — Roof, window, 

door. 
The very flowers are sacred to the Poor, 

The roses to the porch which they entwine: 
Yea, all that now enchants thee, from the day 
On which it should be touch'd, would melt away! 

W. Wordsworth 

CCXCVII 

TO THE HIGHLAND GIRL OF 
INVERSNEYDE 

Sweet Highland Girl, a very shower 
Of beauty is thy earthly dower! 
Twice seven consenting years have shed 
Their utmost bounty on thy head : 



BOOK FOURTH 409 

And these gray rocks, that household lawn, 

Those trees — a veil just half withdrawn, 

This fall of water that doth make 

A murmur near the silent lake, 

This little bay, a quiet road 

That holds in shelter thy abode; 

In truth together ye do seem 

Like something fashion'd in a dream; 

Such forms as from their covert peep 

When earthly cares are laid asleep! 

But O fair Creature! in the light 

Of common day, so heavenly bright, 

I bless Thee, Vision as thou art, 

I bless thee with a human heart: 

God shield thee to thy latest years! 

Thee neither know I nor thy peers: 

And yet my eyes are fill'd with tears. 

With earnest feeling I shall pray 
For thee when I am far away; 
For never saw I mien or face 
In which more plainly I could trace 
Benignity and home-bred sense 
Ripening in perfect innocence. 
Here scatter'd, like a random seed, 
Remote from men. Thou dost not need 
The embarrass'd look of shy distress, 
And maidenly shamef acedness : 
Thou wear'st upon thy forehead clear 
The freedom of a Mountaineer : 
A face with gladness overspread; 



410 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Soft smiles, by human kindness bred; 
And seemliness complete, that sways 
Thy courtesies, about thee plays; 
With no restraint, but such as springs 
From quick and eager visitings 
Of thoughts that lie beyond the reach 
Of thy few words of English speech : 
A bondage sweetly brook'd, a strife 
That gives thy gestures grace and Ufa ! 
So have I, not unmoved in mind, 
Seen birds of tempest-loving kind — 
Thus beating up against the wind. 

What hand but would a garland cull 
For thee who art so beautiful? 
O happy pleasure ! here to dwell 
Beside thee in some heathy dell; 
Adopt your homely ways, and dress, 
A shepherd, thou a shepherdess! 
But I could frame a wish for thee 
More like a grave reality : 
Thou art to me but as a wave 
Of the wild sea : and I would have 
Some claim upon thee, if I could, 
Though but of common neighbourhood. 
What joy to hear thee, and to see! 
Thy elder brother I would be, 
Thy father — anything to thee. 

Now thanks to Heaven ! that of its grace 
Hath led me to this lonely place: 



BOOK FOURTH 411 

Joy have I had; and going hence 

I bear away my recompence. 

In spots like these it is we prize 

Our Memory, feel that she hath eyes: 

Then why should I be loth to stir? 

I feel this place was made for her; 

To give new pleasure like the past, 

Continued long as life shall last. 

Nor am I loth, though pleased at heart, 

Sweet Highland Girl! from thee to part; 

For I, methinks, till I grow old 

As fair before me shall behold 

As I do now, the cabin small, 

The lake, the bay, the waterfall; 

And Thee, the Spirit of them all ! 

W. Wordsworth 

CCXCVIII 

THE REAPER 

Behold her, single in the field, 
Yon solitary Highland Lass! 
Reaping and singing by herself; 
Stop here, or gently pass ! 
Alone she cuts and binds the grain, 
And sings a melancholy strain; 
listen! for the vale profound 
Is overflowing with the sound. 

No nightingale did ever chaunt 
More welcome notes to weary bands 



412 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Of travellers in some shady haunt, 
Among Arabian sands: 
A voice so thrilling ne'er was heard 
In spring-time from the cuckoo-bird, 
Breaking the silence of the seas 
Among the farthest Hebrides. 

Will no one tell me what she sings? 
Perhaps the plaintive numbers flow 
For old, unhappy, far-off things. 
And battles long ago: 
Or is it some more humble lay, 
Familiar matter of to-day? 
Some natural sorrow, loss, or pain. 
That has been, and may be again! 

Whate'er the theme, the maiden sang 
As if her song could have no ending; 
I saw her singing at her work, 
And o'er the sickle bending; — 
I listen'd, motionless and still; 
And, as I mounted up the hill, 
The music in my heart I bore 
Long after it was heard no more. 

W. Wordsworth 

CCXCIX 

THE REVERIE OF POOR SUSAN 

At the corner of Wood Street, when daylight appears. 
Hangs a Thrush that sings loud, it has sung for three 
years : 



BOOK FOURTH 413 

Poor Susan has pass'd by the spot, and has heard 
In the silence of morning the song of the bird. 

'Tis a note of enchantment; what ails her? She sees 
A mountain ascending, a vision of trees; 
Bright volumes of vapour through Lothbury glide. 
And a river flows on through the vale of Cheapside. 

Green pastures she views in the midst of the dale 
Down which she so often has tripp'd with her pail; 
And a single small cottage, a nest like a dove's, 
The one only dwelling on earth that she loves. 

She looks, and her heart is in heaven : but they fade, 
The mist and the river, the hill and the shade; 
The stream will not flow, and the hill will not rise, 
And the colours have all pass'd away from her eyes! 

W. Wordsworth 

CCC 

TO A LADY, WITH A GUITAR 

Ariel to Miranda : — Take 

This slave of music, for the sake 

Of him, who is the slave of thee; 

And teach it all the harmony 

In which thou canst, and only thou. 

Make the delighted spirit glow, 

Till joy denies itself again 

And, too inteuse, is turn'd to pain. 

For by permission and command 



414 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Of thine own Prince Ferdinand, 

Poor Ariel sends this silent token 

Of more than ever can be spoken; 

Your guardian spirit, Ariel, who 

From life to life must still pursue 

Your happiness, for thus alone 

Can Ariel ever find his own. 

From Prospero's enchanted cell, 

As the mighty verses tell. 

To the throne of Naples he 

Lit you o'er the trackless sea, 

Flitting on, your prow before. 

Like a living meteor. 

When you die, the silent Moon 

In her interlunar swoon 

Is not sadder in her cell 

Than deserted Ariel : — 

When you live again on earth, 

Like an unseen Star of birth 

Ariel guides you o'er the sea 

Of life from your nativity : — 

Many changes have been run 

Since Ferdinand and you begun 

Your course of love, and Ariel still 

Has track'd your steps and served your will. 

Now in humbler, happier lot, 

This is all remember'd not; 

And now, alas ! the poor Sprite is 

Imprison'd for some fault of his 

In a body like a grave — 

From you he only dares to crave, 



BOOK FOURTH 415 

For his service and his sorrow 
A smile to-day, a song to-morrow. 

The artist who this idol wrought 

To echo all harmonious thought, 

Feird a tree, while on the steep 

The woods were in their winter sleep, 

Rock'd in that repose divine 

On the wind-swept Apennine; 

And dreaming, some of Autumn past, 

And some of Spring approaching fast, 

And some of April buds and showers, 

And some of songs in July bowers. 

And all of love : And so this tree, — 

Oh that such our death may be ! — 

Died in sleep, and felt no pain. 

To live in happier form again: 

From which, beneath heaven's fairest star, 

The artist wrought this loved Guitar; 

And taught it justly to reply 

To all who question skilfully 

In language gentle as thine own; 

Whispering in enamour'd tone 

Sweet oracles of woods and dells. 

And summer winds in sylvan cells : 

— For it had learnt all harmonies 

Of the plains and of the skies. 

Of the forests and the mountains, 

And the many- voiced fountains; 

The clearest echoes of the hills. 

The softest notes of falling rills, * 



416 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

The melodies of birds and bees, 
The murmuring of summer seas, 
And pattering rain, and breathing dew, 
And airs of evening; and it knew 
That seldom-heard mysterious sound 
Which, driven on its diurnal round. 
As it floats through boundless day, 
Our world enkindles on its way: 
— All this it knows, but will not tell 
To those who cannot question well 
The Spirit that inhabits it; 
It talks according to the wit 
Of its companions; and no more 
Is heard than has been felt before 
By those who tempt it to betray 
These secrets of an elder day. 
But, sweetly as it answers will 
Flatter hands of perfect skill. 
It keeps its highest holiest tone 
For our beloved Friend alone. 

P. B. Shelley 

CCCI 

THE DAFFODILS 

I wander'd lonely as a cloud 

That floats on high o'er vales and hills, 

When all at once I saw a crowd, 

A host of golden daffodils, 

Beside the lake, beneath the trees. 

Fluttering and dancing in the breeze. 



BOOK FOURTH 417 

Continuous as the stars that shine 
And twinkle on the milky way, 
They stretch'd in never-ending line 
Along the margin of a bay: 
Ten thousand saw I at a glance 
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance. 

The waves beside them danced, but they 

Out-did the sparkling waves in glee : — 

A Poet could not but be gay 

In such a jocund company! 

I gazed — and gazed — but little thought 

What wealth the show to me had brought; 

For oft, when on my couch I he 
In vacant or in pensive mood, 
They flash upon that inward eye 
Which is the bliss of solitude; 
And then my heart with pleasure fills, 
And dances with the daffodils. 

W. Wordsworth 

CCCII 

TO THE DAISY 

With little here to do or see 
Of things that in the great world be, 
Sweet Daisy! oft I talk to thee 
For thou art worthy, 
. Thou unassuming Common-place 
Of Nature, with that homely face, 



418 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

And yet with something of a grace 
Which Love makes for thee! 

Oft on the dappled turf at ease 

I sit and play with similes, 

Loose types of things through all degrees, 

Thoughts of thy raising; 
And many a fond and idle name 
I give to thee, for praise or blame 
As is the humour of the game, 

While I am gazing. 

A nun demure, of lowly port; 

Or sprightly maiden, of Love's court. 

In thy simplicity the sport 

Of all temptations; 
A queen in crown of rubies drest; 
A starveling in a scanty vest; 
Are all, as seems to suit thee best, 

Thy appellations. 

A little Cyclops, with one eye 

Staring to threaten and defy, 

That thought comes next — and instantly 

The freak is over, 
The shape will vanish, and behold! 
A silver shield with boss of gold 
That spreads itself, some faery bold 

In fight to cover. 

I see thee glittering from afar — 
And then thou art a pretty star. 



BOOK FOURTH 419 

Not quite so fair as many are 

In heaven above thee! 
Yet like a star, with ghttering crest, 
Self -poised in air thou seem'st to rest; — 
May peace come never to his nest 

Who shall reprove thee! 

Sweet Flower! for by that name at last 

When all my reveries are past 

I call thee, and to that cleave fast. 

Sweet silent Creature! 
That breath'st with me in sun and air, 
Do thou, as thou art wont, repair 
My heart with gladness, and a share 

Of thy meek nature! 

W. Wordsworth 

CCCIII 

ODE TO AUTUMN 

Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness. 

Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun; 

Conspiring with him how to load and bless 

With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eaves run; 

To bend with apples the moss'd cottage-trees. 

And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core; 

To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells 

With a sweet kernel; to set budding more. 

And still more, later flowers for the bees, 

Until they think warm days will never cease; 

For Summer has o'erbrimm'd their clammy cells. 



420 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store? 
Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find 
Thee sitting careless on a granary floor, 
Thy hair soft-hfted by the winnowing wind; 
Or on a half-reap'd furrow sound asleep, 
Drowsed with the fume of poppies, while thy hook 
Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers: 
And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep 
Steady thy laden head across a brook; 
Or by a cyder-press, with patient look, 
Thou watchest the last oozings, hours by hours. 

Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they? 

Think not of them, thou hast thy music too, — 

While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day 

And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue; 

Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn 

Among the river-sallows, borne aloft 

Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies; 

And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn; 

Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft 

The red-breast whistles from a garden-croft; 

And gathering swallows twitter in the skies. 

J. Keats 

CCCIV 
ODE TO WINTER 

Germany, December, 1800 

When first the fiery-mantled Sun 
His heavenly race began to run, 



BOOK FOURTH 421 

Round the earth and ocean blue 
His children four the Seasons flew. 

First, in green apparel dancing, 
The young Spring smiled with angel-grace; 

Rosy Summer next advancing, 
Rush'd into her sire's embrace — 
Her bright-hair'd sire, who bade her keep 

For ever nearest to his smiles. 
On Calpe's olive-shaded steep 

Or India's citron-cover'd isles: 
More remote, and buxom-brown, 

The Queen of vintage bow'd before his throne; 
A rich pomegranate gemm'd her crown, 

A ripe sheaf bound her zone. 

But howling Winter fled afar 
To hills that prop the polar star; 
And loves on deer-borne car to ride 
With barren darkness by his side, 
Round the shore where loud Lofoden 

Whirls to death the roaring whale, 
Round the hall where Runic Odin 

Howls his war-song to the gale; 
Save when adown the ravaged globe 

He travels on his native storm. 
Deflowering Nature's grassy robe 

And trampling on her faded form : — 
Till light's returning Lord assume 

The shaft that drives him to his polar field, 
Of power to pierce his raven plume 

And crystal-cover'd shield. 



422 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Oh, sire of storms! whose savage ear 
The Lapland drum delights to hear, 
When Frenzy with her blood-shot eye 
Implores thy dreadful deity — 
Archangel! Power of desolation! 

Fast descending as thou art. 
Say, hath mortal invocation 

Spells to touch thy stony heart? 
Then, sullen Winter! hear my prayer, 

And gently rule the ruin'd year; 
Nor chill the wanderer's bosom bare 

Nor freeze the wretch's falling tear: 
To shuddering Want's unmantled bed 

Thy horror-breathing agues cease to lend, 
And gently on the orphan head 

Of Innocence descend. 

But chiefly spare, king of clouds! 
The sailor on his airy shrouds. 
When wrecks and beacons strew the steep, 
And spectres walk along the deep. 
Milder yet thy snowy breezes 

Pour on yonder tented shores, 
Where the Rhine's broad billow freezes. 

Or the dark-brown Danube roars. 
Oh, winds of Winter! list ye there 

To many a deep and dying groan? 
Or start, ye demons of the midnight air. 

At shrieks and thunders louder than your own? 
Alas! ev'n your unhallow'd breath 

May spare the victim fallen low; 



BOOK FOURTH 423 

But Man will ask no truce to death, — 
No bounds to human woe. 

T. Campbell 

CCCV 
YARROW UNVISITED 
1803 
From Stirling Castle we had seen 
The mazy Forth unravell'd, 
Had trod the banks of Clyde and Tay 
And with the Tweed had travell'd; 
And when we came to Clovenford, 
Then said my 'winsome Marrow/ 
'Whate'er betide, we'll turn aside, 
And see the Braes of Yarrow.' 

' Let Yarrow folk, frae Selkirk town, 

Who have been buying, selling. 

Go back to Yarrow, 'tis their own, 

Each maiden to her dwelling! 

On Yarrow's banks let herons feed, 

Hares couch, and rabbits burrow; 

But we will downward with the Tweed, 

Nor turn aside to Yarrow. 

'There's Gala Water, Leader Haughs, 

Both lying right before us; 

And Dryburgh, where with chiming Tweed 

The lintwhites sing in chorus; 

There's pleasant Tiviot-dale, a land 



424 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Made blithe with plough and harrow: 
Why throw away a needful day 
To go in search of Yarrow? 

'What's Yarrow but a river bare 

That glides the dark hills under? 

There are a thousand such elsewhere 

As worthy of your wonder.' 

— Strange words they seem'd of slight and scorn; 

My True-love sigh'd for sorrow, 

And look'd me in the face, to think 

I thus could speak of Yarrow! 

*0 green,' said I, 'are Yarrow's holms, 
And sweet is Yarrow flowing! 
Fair hangs the apple frae the rock, 
But we will leave it growing. 
O'er hilly path and open strath 
We'll wander Scotland thorough; 
But, though so near, we will not turn 
Into the dale of Yarrow. 

' Let beeves and home-bred kine partake 
The sweets of Burn-mill meadow; 
The swan on still Saint Mary's Lake 
Float double, swan and shadow! 
We will not see them; will not go 
To-day, nor yet to-morrow; 
Enough if in our hearts we know 
There's such a place as Yarrow. 



BOOK FOURTH 425 

'Be Yarrow stream unseen, unknown! 
It must, or we shall rue it: 
We have a vision of our own, 
Ah ! why should we undo it? 
The treasured dreams of times long past, 
We'll keep them, winsome Marrow! 
For when we're there, although 'tis fair, 
'Twill be another Yarrow! 

*If Care with freezing years should come 

And wandering seem but folly, — 

Should we be loth to stir from home, 

And yet be melancholy; 

Should life be dull, and spirits low, 

'Twill soothe us in our sorrow 

That earth has something yet to show, 

The bonny holms of Yarrow ! ' 

W. Wordsworth 

CCCVI 
YARROW VISITED 

September, 181 4 
And is this — Yarrow? — This the stream 
Of which my fancy cherish'd 
So faithfully, a waking dream. 
An image that hath perish'd? 
O that some minstrel's harp were near 
To utter notes of gladness 
And chase this silence from the air, 
That fills my heart with sadness! 



426 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Yet why? — a silvery current flows 

With uncontroird meanderings; 

Nor have these eyes by greener hills 

Been soothed, in all my wanderings. 

And, through her depths, Saint Mary's Lake 

Is visibly delighted; 

For not a feature of those hills 

Is in the mirror slighted. 

A blue sky bends o'er Yarrow Vale, 

Save where that pearly whiteness 

Is round the rising sun diffused, 

A tender hazy brightness; 

Mild dawn of promise ! that excludes 

All profitless dejection; 

Though not unwilling here to admit 

A pensive recollection. 

Where was it that the famous Flower 

Of Yarrow Vale lay bleeding? 

His bed perchance was yon smooth mound 

On which the herd is feeding: 

And haply from this crystal pool, 

Now peaceful as the morning. 

The Water-wraith ascended thrice, 

And gave his doleful warning. 

Delicious is the lay that sings 

The haunts of happy lovers. 

The path that leads them to the grove, 

The leafy grove that covers: 



BOOK FOURTH 427 

And pity sanctifies the verse 
That paints, by strength of sorrow, 
The unconquerable strength of love; 
Bear witness, rueful Yarrow! 

But thou that didst appear so fair 

To fond imagination. 

Dost rival in the light of day 

Her delicate creation: 

Meek loveliness is round thee spread, 

A softness still and holy: 

The grace of forest charms decay'd, 

And pastoral melancholy. 

That region left, the vale unfolds 

Rich groves of lofty stature, 

With Yarrow winding through the pomp 

Of cultivated nature; 

And rising from those lofty groves 

Behold a ruin hoary, 

The shattered front of Newark's towers, 

Renown'd in Border story. 

Fair scenes for childhood's opening bloom, 

For sportive youth to stray in. 

For manhood to enjoy his strength, 

And age to wear away in! 

Yon cottage seems a bower of bliss, 

A covert for protection 

Of tender thoughts that nestle there — 

The brood of chaste affection. 



428 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

How sweet on this autumnal day 

The wild-wood fruits to gather, 

And on my True-love's forehead plant 

A crest of blooming heather! 

And what if I enwreathed my own? 

'Twere no offence to reason; 

The sober hills thus deck their brows 

To meet the wintry season. 

I see — but not by sight alone, 

Loved Yarrow, have I won thee; 

A ray of Fancy still survives — 

Her sunshine plays upon thee! 

Thy ever-youthful waters keep 

A course of lively pleasure; 

And gladsome notes my lips can breathe 

Accordant to the measure. 

The vapours linger round the heights, 
They melt, and soon must vanish; 
One hour is theirs, nor more is mine — 
Sad thought! which I would banish, 
But that I know, where'er I go. 
Thy genuine image. Yarrow! 
Will dwell with me, to heighten joy, 
And cheer my mind in sorrow. 

W. Wordsworth 



BOOK FOURTH 429 

CCCVII 

THE INVITATION 

Best and brightest, come away, — 

Fairer far than this fair Day, 

Which, hke thee, to those in sorrow 

Comes to bid a sweet good-morrow 

To the rough year just awake 

In its cradle on the brake. 

The brightest hour of unborn Spring 

Through the winter wandering. 

Found, it seems, the halcyon morn 

To hoar February born; 

Bending from heaven, in azure mirth, 

It kiss'd the forehead of the earth, 

And smiled upon the silent sea, 

And bade the frozen streams be free, 

And waked to music all their fountains. 

And breathed upon the frozen mountains, 

And hke a prophetess of May 

Strew'd flowers upon the barren way, 

Making the wintry world appear 

Like one on whom thou smilest, dear. 

Away, away, from men and towns. 
To the wild wood and the downs — 
To the silent wilderness 
Where the soul need not repress 
Its music, lest it should not find 
An echo in another's mind. 



430 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

While the touch of Nature's art 
Harmonizes heart to heart. 

Radiant Sister of the Day 
Awake! arise! and come away! 
To the wild woods and the plains, 
To the ])ools where winter rains 
Image all their roof of leaves, 
Where the pine its garland weaves 
Of sai^less green, and ivy dun, 
Round stems that never kiss the sun; 
Where the lawns and pastures be 
And the sandliills of ihv sea; 
Where the melting hoar-frost wets 
The daisy-star that never sets. 
And wind-fl()vv(^rs and violets 
Which yet join not scent to hue 
Crown the pale year weak and new; 
When the night is left behind 
In the deep east, dim and blind. 
And the blue noon is over us, 
And the nuiltitudinous 
Billows murnuu" at our feet. 
Where the earth and ocean meet, 
And all things seem only one 
In the universal Sun. 

P. B. Shelley 



HOOK FO I JUT J I 431 

cxx:vjii 

TUV] ilJX:()].I.KrTION 

Now tli(; Jjisl (Jiiy (jf u\'<u\y djiys * 
All beautiful and brij!,lit a.s thou, 
Tho lovdioHt and i\\v, last, is dc^ad: 
RiHCi, Mornory, and wriif; its praise! 
Up — to thy wonted work! (-(jnic, trace 
Tho (jpitaph of glory fled, 
For now tlic; (;arth has changed its face, 
A frown is on the h(;av(;n's \)Vi)\w. 

W(; wand(;r'd to tlif; Pine; Forest 

Tliat skirts the ()c(;an's foam; 
The liglitest wind was in its nest, 

The ten:ipest in its home. 
Th(! whisfH'ring waves w(.'re half asleep, 

The clouds were gone to i)lay, 
And on the bosom of the de(;[) 

The; smil(! of heav(;n lay; 
It se(;m'd as if the hour were one 

Sent from beyond tin; skies 
Which seatt(;r'd from aljove the; sun 

A light of Faradis(i! 

W(; pauscKl amid the pines that stood 

'i'h(! giants of the wast(^, 
Tortured by storms to shap(;s as rude 

As serpents interlaced, ■ — 
And soothed by (jvery azure brciath 

That iind<'r heuv(;n is blown, 



432 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

To harmonies and hues beneath, 

As tender as its own: 
Now all the tree-tops lay asleep 

Like green waves on the sea, 
As still as in the silent deep 

The ocean-woods may be. 

How calm it was ! — The silence there 

By such a chain was bound, 
That even the busy woodpecker 

Made stiller with her sound 
The inviolable quietness; 

The breath of peace we drew 
With its soft motion made not less 

The calm that round us grew. 
There seem'd, from the remotest seat 

Of the white mountain waste 
To the soft flower beneath our feet, 

A magic circle traced, — 
A spirit interfused around, 

A thrilling silent life; 
To momentary peace it bound 

Our mortal nature's strife; — 
And still I felt the centre of 

The magic circle there 
Was one fair form that fill'd with love 

The lifeless atmosphere. 

We paused beside the pools that lie 

Under the forest bough; 
Each seem'd as 'twere a httle sky 



BOOK FOURTH 433 

Gulf d in a world below; 
A firmament of purple light 

Which in the dark earth lay, 
More boundless than the depth of night 

And purer than the day — 
In which the lovely forests grew 

As in the upper air, 
More perfect both in shape and hue 

Than any spreading there. 
There lay the glade and neighbouring lawn, 

And through the dark-green wood 
The white sun twinkling like the dawn 

Out of a speckled cloud. 
Sweet views which in our world above 

Can never well be seen 
Were imaged in the water's love 

Of that fair forest green : 
And all was interfused beneath 

With an Elysian glow, 
An atmosphere without a breath, 

A softer day below. 
Like one beloved, the scene had lent 

To the dark water's breast 
Its every leaf and lineament 

With more than truth exprest; 
Until an envious wind crept by, 

Like an unwelcom.e thought 
Which from the mind's too faithful eye 

Blots one dear image out. 
— Though thou art ever fair and kind, 

The forests ever green, 



434 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Less oft is peace in Shelley's mind 
Than calm in waters seen! 

P. B. Shelley 

CCCIX 

BY THE SEA 

It is a beauteous evening, calm and free; 
The holy time is quiet as a Nun 
Breathless with adoration; the broad sun 
Is sinking down in its tranquillity; 

The gentleness of heaven is on the Sea: 
Listen! the mighty Being is awake, 
And doth with his eternal motion make 
A sound like thunder — everlastingly. 

Dear child! dear girl! that walkest with me here, 
If thou appear untouched by solemn thought 
Thy nature is not therefore less divine : 

Thou hest in Abraham's bosom all the year, 
And worshipp'st at the Temple's inner shrine, 
God being with thee when we know it not. 

W. Wordsworth 

CCCX 

SONG TO THE EVENING STAR 

Star that bringest home the bee. 
And sett'st the weary labourer free! 



BOOK FOURTH 435 

If any star shed peace, 'tis Thou 

That send'st it from above, 
Appearing when Heaven's breath and brow 

Are sweet as hers we love. 

Come to the luxuriant skies, 
Whilst the landscape's odours rise, 
Whilst far-off lowing herds are heard 

And songs when toil is done. 
From cottages whose smoke unstirr'd 

Curls yellow in the sun. 

Star of love's soft interviews. 
Parted lovers on thee muse; 
Their remembrancer in Heaven 

Of thrilling vows thou art, 
Too dehcious to be riven 

By absence from the heart. 

T. Campbell 

CCCXI 
DATUR HORA QUIETI 

The sun upon the lake is low, 

The wild birds hush their song. 
The hills have evening's deepest glow, 

Yet Leonard tarries long. 
Now all whom varied toil and care 

From home and love divide. 
In the calm sunset may repair 

Each to the loved one's side. 



436 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

The noble dame, on turret high, 

Who waits her gallant knight, 
Looks to the western beam to spy 

The flash of armour bright. 
The village maid, with hand on brow 

The level ray to shade. 
Upon the footpath watches now 

For Colin's darkening plaid. 

Now to their mates the wild swans row, 

By day they swam apart. 
And to the thicket wanders slow 

The hind beside the hart. 
The woodlark at his partner's side 

Twitters his closing song — 
All meet whom day and care divide. 

But Leonard tarries long! 

Sir W. Scott 

CCCXII 

TO THE MOON 

Art thou pale for weariness 
Of climbing heaven, and gazing on the earth, 

Wandering companionless 
Among the stars that have a different birth, — 
And ever-changing, like a joyless eye 
That finds no object worth its constancy? 

P. B. Shelley 



BOOK FOURTH 437 

CCCXIII 

TO SLEEP 

A FLOCK of sheep that leisurely pass by 
One after one; the sound of rain, and bees 
Murmuring; the fall of rivers, winds and seas, 
Smooth fields, white sheets of water, and pure sky; 

I've thought of all by turns, and yet do lie 
Sleepless; and soon the small birds' melodies 
Must hear, first utter'd from my orchard trees, 
And the first cuckoo's melancholy cry. 

Even thus last night, and two nights more I lay, 
And could not win thee, Sleep! by any stealth: 
So do not let me wear to-night away: 

Without Thee what is all the morning's wealth? 
Come, blessed barrier between day and day, 
Dear mother of fresh thoughts and joyous health! 

W. Wordsworth 

CCCXIV 
THE SOLDIER'S DREAM 

Our bugles sang truce, for the night-cloud had lower'd. 
And the sentinel stars set their watch in the sky; 

And thousands had sunk on the ground overpower'd, 
The weary to sleep, and the wounded to die. 

When reposing that night on my pallet of straw 
By the wolf -scaring faggot that guarded the slain, 



438 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

At the dead of the night a sweet Vision I saw; 
And thrice ere the morning I dreamt it again. 

Methought from the battle-field's dreadful array 
Far, far, I had roam'd on a desolate track: 

'Twas Autumn. — and sunshine arose on the way 
To the home of my fathers, that welcomed me back. 

I flew to the pleasant fields traversed so oft 

In life's morning march, when my bosom was young; 

I heard my own mountain-goats bleating aloft, 

And knew the sweet strain that the corn-reapers 
sung. 

Then pledged we the wine-cup, and fondly I swore 
From my home and my weeping friends never to 
part; 

My little ones kiss'd me a thousand times o'er, 
And my wife sobb'd aloud in her fulness of heart. 

' Stay — stay with us ! — rest ! — thou art weary and 
worn ! ' — 
And fain was their war-broken soldier to stay; — 
But sorrow return'd with the dawning of morn. 
And the voice in my dreaming ear melted away. 

T. Campbell 

CCCXV 

A DREAM OF THE UNKNOWN 

I dream'd that as I wander'd by the way 
Bare Winter suddenly was changed to Spring, 



BOOK FOURTH 439 

And gentle odours led my steps astray, 
Mix'd with a sound of waters murmuring 

Along a shelving bank of turf, which lay 
Under a copse, and hardly dared to fling 

Its green arms round the bosom of the stream, 

But kiss'd it and then fled, as Thou mightest in dream. 

There grew pied wind-flowers and violets, 
V Daisies, those pearl'd Arcturi of the earth, 
The constellated flower that never sets; 

Faint oxlips; tender blue-bells, at whose birth 
The sod scarce heaved; and that tall flower that wets 
Its mother's face with heaven-collected tears. 
When the low wind, its playmate's voice, it hears. 

And in the warm hedge grew lush eglantine. 

Green cow-bind and the moonlight-colour'd May, 

And cherry-blossoms, and white cups, whose wine 
Was the bright dew yet drain'd not by the day; 

And wild roses, and ivy serpentine 

With its dark buds and leaves, wandering astray; 

And flowers azure, black, and streak'd with gold, 

Fairer than any waken'd eyes behold. 

And nearer to the river's trembling edge 

There grew broad flag-flowers, purple prank'd with 
white. 
And starry river-buds among the sedge. 

And floating water-lilies, broad and bright, 
Which lit the oak that overhung the hedge 

With moonlight beams of their own watery light; 



440 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

And bulrushes, and reeds of such deep green 
As soothed the dazzled eye with sober sheen. 

Methought that of these visionary flowers 
I made a nosegay, bound in such a way 

That the same hues, which in their natural bowers 
Were mingled or opposed, the like array 

Kept these imprisoned children of the Hours 
Within my hand, — and then, elate and gay, 

I hasten'd to the spot whence I had come 

That I might there present it — O ! to Whom? 

P. B, Shelley 

CCCXVI 

KUBLA KHAN 

In Xanadu did Kubla Khan 
A stately pleasure-dome decree: 
Where Alph, the sacred river, ran 
Through caverns measureless to man 

Down to a sunless sea. 
So twice five miles of fertile ground 
With walls and towers were girdled round: 
And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills 
Where blossom'd many an incense-bearing tree; 
And here were forests ancient as the hills, 
Enfolding sunny spots of greenery. 

But oh! that deep rom_antic chasm which slanted 
Down the green hill athwart a cedarn cover! 
A savage place! as holy and enchanted 



BOOK FOURTH 441 

As e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted 

By woman wailing for her demon -lover ! 

And from this chasm, with ceaseless turmoil seething, 

As if this earth in fast thick pants w^ere breathing, 

A mighty fountain momently was forced : 

Amid whose swift half-intermitted burst 

Huge fragments vaulted like rebounding hail. 

Or chaffy grain beneath the thresher's flail : 

And mid these dancing rocks at once and ever 

It flung up momently the sacred river. 

Five miles meandering with a mazy motion 

Through wood and dale the sacred river ran. 

Then reach 'd the caverns measureless to man, 

And sank in tumult to a lifeless ocean: 

And 'mid this tumult Kubla heard from far 

Ancestral voices prophesying war! 

The shadow of the dome of pleasure 

Floated midway on the waves; 

Where was heard the mingled measure 

From the fountain and the caves. 
It was a miracle of rare device, 
A sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice! 

A damsel with a dulcimer 

In a vision once I saw: 

It was an Abyssinian maid. 

And on her dulcimer she play'd, 

Singing of Mount Abora. 

Could I revive within me 

Her symphony and song, 
To such a deep dehght 'twould win me * 



442 777/!.' aOLDEN THl^JASURY 

Tliat with imisic loud and lon^, 
I vvDuld l)uild Muit dome in air, 
That sunny dome! those caves of ice! 
And all wlio heard should s(»e th(un there, 
And all should cry, Hevvare! Heware! 
Ilis flashing eyes, his Hoating hair! 
Weave a circle round him thrice, 
And clos(^ your eyes with holy dread, 
For he on honey-dew hath fed, 
And drunk the milk of Paradise. 

*S'. T. Colendge 

CCCXVII 

Till*: INNKK VISION 

Most sweet it is with uiui|)liftcd eyes 
To pace the ground, if i)ath be there or none, 
While a fair region round the traveller lies 
Which he forbears again to look upon: 

Pleased rather with some soft ideal scene, 
The work of Fancy, or some happy tone 
Of meditation, slipi)ing in between 
The beauty coming and the beauty gone. 

— If Thought and Love desert us, from that day 
Let us break off all commerce with the Muse: 
With Thought and Love companions of our way — 

What(^'er th(^ sens(\s takc^ or may refuse, — 
The Mind's internal heaven shall shed her dews 
Of inspiration on the humblest lay. 

W. Wordsworth 




BOOK FOVUTH 



(xx:xviii 



443 



iX 



Til 10 HIOALM OK FANCY 



lOviOK \v\, il»(; Fancy roam; 

J*l(^asur(i n(!V(!r is at [ioiiu;: 

At a (,()U(;h swcu^i Ph^asurci iru^ltoth, 

Lik(^ lo l)ul)l)l(;s wh(!ri rain ])(;li(!ih; 

Tlicn !(!<, winj!;o(l r'an(;y wandcir 

Tlir()U|!;li Mi(! Uiou^ht still s[)r(;ad beyond her: 

Open wid(; th(; mind's (iji^cMloor, 

She'll dart I'ortl), and (tloudward soar. 

() sw(H;t Fan(!y! let lici- loos(^; 

Summer's joys iivv. spoilt hy use, 

Arid tli(^ (^njoyinj;- of tin; S[)rinj5 

Fades as does its blossoming; 

Antnnm's rcMl-lipp'd rruil-aj;(! too, 

Blushing throuji;li tlu^ mist and d(;w, 

( !loys with tastinji;: What do then? 

Sit the(5 l)y the; in}j;le, when 

The sear bi^^ot bla/es bright, 

Spirit of a winter's nijj^ht; 

When the soundless earth is mndled, 

And th(i (taked snow is shudhMl 

From th(^ |)lou^hb()y's hc^avy shoon; 

Wh(!n th(! Ni^ht doth iru^^t the Noon 

In adark (^onspirac^y 

To vanish l<]ven Ironi lier sky. 

Sit thee there, and s(^n(l abroad, 

With a mind sell-overaw'd, 

Fancy, high-eonmiission'd: — send her! 



444 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

She has vassals to attend her: 

She will bring, in spite of frost, 

Beauties that the earth hath lost; 

She will bring thee, all together, 

All delights of summer weather; 

All the buds and bells of May, 

From dewy sward or thorny spray; 

All the heaped Autumn's wealth, 

With a still, mysterious stealth: 

She will mix these pleasures up 

Like three fit wines in a cup. 

And thou shalt quaff it: — thou shalt hear 

Distant harvest-carols clear; 

Rustle of the reaped corn; 

Sweet birds antheming the morn: 

And, in the same moment — hark! 

'Tis the early April lark. 

Or the rooks, with busy caw, 

Foraging for sticks and straw. 

Thou shalt, at one glance, behold 

The daisy and the marigold; 

White-plumed lilies, and the first 

Hedge-grown primrose that hath burst; 

Shaded hyacinth, alway 

Sapphire queen of the mid-May; 

And every leaf, and every flower 

Pearled with the self-same shower. 

Thou shalt see the field-mouse peep 

Meagre from its celled sleep; 

And the snake all winter-thin 

Cast on sunny bank its skin; 



BOOK FOURTH 445 

Freckled nest-eggs thou shalt see 
Hatching in the hawthorn-tree, 
When the hen-bird's wing doth rest 
Quiet on her mossy nest; 
Then the hurry and alarm 
When the bee-hive casts its swarm; 
Acorns ripe down-pattering, 
While the autumn breezes sing. • 

Oh, sweet Fancy! let her loose; 
Everything is spoilt by use: 
Where's the cheek that doth not fade, 
Too much gazed at? Where's the maid 
Whose lip mature is ever new? 
Where's the eye, however blue. 
Doth not weary? Where's the face 
One would meet in every place? 
Where's the voice, however soft, 
One would hear so very oft? 
At a touch sweet Pleasure melteth 
Like to bubbles when rain pelteth. 
Let then winged Fancy find 
Thee a mistress to thy mind : 
Dulcet-eyed as Ceres' daughter. 
Ere the God of Torment taught her 
How to frown and how to chide; 
With a waist and with a side 
White as Hebe's, when her zone 
Slipt its golden clasp, and down 
Fell her kirtle to her feet, 
While 3he held the goblet sweet, 



446 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

And Jove grew languid. — Break the mesh 
Of the Fancy's silken leash; 
Quickly break her prison-string, 
And such joys as these she'll bring. 
— Let the winged Fancy roam, 
Pleasure never is at home. 

J. Keats 



CCCXIX 

WRITTEN IN EARLY SPRING 

I HEARD a thousand blended notes 
While in a grove I sate reclined, 
In that sweet mood when pleasant thoughts 
Bring sad thoughts to the mind. 

To her fair works did Nature link 
The human soul that through me ran; 
And much it grieved my heart to think 
What Man has made of Man. 

Through primrose tufts, in that sweet bower, 
The periwinkle trail'd its wreaths; 
And 'tis my faith that every flower 
Enjoys the air it breathes. 

The birds around me hopp'd and play'd, 
Their thoughts I cannot measure, — 
But the least motion which they made 
It seem'd a thrill of pleasure. 



BOOK FOURTH 447 

The budding twigs spread out their fan 
To catch the breezy air; 
And I must think, do all I can, 
That there was pleasure there. 

If this belief from heaven be sent, 
If such be Nature's holy plan. 
Have I not reason to lament 
What Man has made of Man? 

W. Wordsworth 



CCCXX 

RUTH: OR THE INFLUENCES OF 
NATURE 

When Ruth was left half desolate 
Her father took another mate; 
And Ruth, not seven years old, 
A slighted child, at her own will 
Went wandering over dale and hill, 
In thoughtless freedom, bold. 

And she had made a pipe of straw. 
And music from that pipe could draw 
Like sounds of winds and floods; 
Had built a bower upon the green. 
As if she from her birth had been 
An infant of the woods. 

Beneath her father's roof, alone 

She seem'd to live; her thoughts her own; 



448 THE aOLDEN TREASURY 

Herself her own deliglit: 
Pleiused with lierscH", nor sad nor gay; 
And passing thus (lu> live-long day, 
She grew to woman's lieight. 

There came a youth from Georgia's shore 

A military casque he wore 

With splendid feathers drest; 

He brought them from the Cherokees; 

The feathers nodded in the breeze 

And made a gallant crest. 

From Indian blood you deem him sprung: 
But no! he si)ak(^ the English tongue 
And bore a soldier's name; 
And, when America was free 
From battle and from jeopardy, 
He 'cross the ocean came. 

With hues of genius on his cheek, 

In finest tones the youth could speak : 

— While he was yet a boy 

The moon, the glory of the sun, 

And streams that nmnnur as they run 

Had been his dearest joy. 

He was a lovely youth! I guess 

The panthc^r in the wilderness 

Was not so fair as he; 

And when he chose to sport and play, 

No dolphin ever was so gay 

Upon the tropic sea. 



BOOK FOURTH 449 

Among the Indians he had fought; 

And with him many tales he brought 

Of pleasure and of fear; 

Such tales as, told to any maid 

By such a youth, in the green shade, 

Were perilous to hear. 

He told of girls, a hapi)y rout! 

Who quit their fold with dance and shout, 

Their pleasant Indian town, 

To gather strawberries all day long; 

Returning with a choral song 

When daylight is gone down. 

He spake of plants that hourly change 
Their blossoms, through a boundless range 
Of intermingling hues; 
With budding, fading, faded flowers, 
They stand the. wonder of the bowers 
From morn to evening dews. 

He told of the magnolia, spread 

High as a cloud, high over head 

The cypress and her spire; 

— Of flowers that with one scarlet gleam 

Cover a hundred leagues, and seem 

To set the hills on fire. 

The youth of green savannahs spake, 
And many an endless, endless lake 
With all its fairy crowds 



450 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Of islands, that together lie 
As quietly as spots of sky 
Among the evening clouds. 

'How pleasant/ then he said, 'it were 

A fisher or a hunter there, 

In sunshine or in shade 

To wander with an easy mind. 

And build a household fire, and find 

A home in every glade! 

'What days and what bright years! Ah me! 

Our life were life indeed, with thee 

So pass'd in quiet bliss; 

And all the while,' said he, 'to know 

That we were in a world of woe, 

On such an earth as this ! ' 

And then he sometimes interwove 
Fond thoughts about a father's love, 
'For there,' said he, 'are spun 
Around the heart such tender ties, 
That our own children to our eyes 
Are dearer than the sun. 

' Sweet Ruth ! and could you go with me 

My helpmate in the woods to be, 

Our shed at night to rear; 

Or run, my own adopted bride, 

A sylvan huntress at my side, 

And drive the flying deer! 



BOOK FOURTH 451 

* Beloved Ruth!' — No more he said. 
The wakeful Ruth at midnight shed 
A solitary tear: 

She thought again — and did agree 
With him to sail across the sea, 
And drive the flying deer. 

' And now, as fitting is and right, 
We in the church our faith will plight, 
A husband and a wife.' 
Even so they did; and I may say 
That to sweet Ruth that happy day 
Was more than human life. 

Through dream and vision did she sink, 
Delighted all the while to think 
That, on those lonesome floods 
And green savannahs, she should share 
His board with lawful joy, and bear 
His name in the wild woods. 

But, as you have before been told, 
This Stripling, sportive, gay, and bold. 
And with his dancing crest 
So beautiful, through savage lands 
Had roam'd about, with vagrant bands 
Of Indians in the West. 

The wind, the tempest roaring high, 
The tumult of a tropic sky 
Might well be dangerous food 



452 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

For him, a youth to whom was given 
So much of earth — so much of heaven, 
And such impetuous blood. 

Whatever in those chmes he found 

IrreguUxr in sight or sound 

Did to his mind imimrt 

A kindred impulse, seem'd alHed 

To his own powers, and justified 

The workings of his heart. 

Nor less, to feed voluptuous thought, 
The beauteous forms of Nature wrought, 
Fair trees and gorgeous flowers; 
The breezes their own languor lent; 
The stars had feelings, which they sent 
Into those favour'd bowers. 

Yet, in his worst pursuits, I ween 
That sometimes there did intervene 
Pure hopes of high intent: 
For passions link'd to forms so fair 
And stately, needs must have their share 
Of noble sentiment. 

But ill he lived, much evil saw, 
With men to whom no better law 
Nor better life was known; 
Deliberately and undeceived 
Those wild men's vices he received, 
And gave them back his own. 



BOOK FOURTH 453 

His genius and his moral franrio 
Were thus inipair'd, and lie* became 
The slave of low desires: 
A man who without self-control 
Would seek what the degraded soul 
Unworthily admires. 

And yet he with no feign'd delight 
Had woo'd the maiden, day and night 
Had loved }ier, night and morn: 
What could he less than love a maid 
Whose heart with so much nature play'd — 
So kind and so forlorn? 

Sometimes most earnestly he said, 
'O Ruth! I have been worse than dead; 
False thouglits, thoughts bold and vain 
Encompassed me on every side 
When I, in confidence and pride, 
Had cross'd the Atlantic main. 

'Before me shone a glorious world 
Fresh as a banner bright, unfurl'd 
To music sudd(;nly: 
I look'd upon those hills and plains. 
And seem'd as if let loose froin chains 
To live at liberty! 

' No more of this — for now, by thee. 

Dear Ruth! more happily set free, 

With nobler zeal I burn; * 



454 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

My soul from darkness is released 
Like the whole sky when to the east 
The morning doth return.' 

Full soon that better mind was gone; 
No hope, no wish remain'd, not one, — 
They stirr'd him now no more; 
New objects did new pleasure give, 
And once again he wish'd to live 
As lawless as before. 

Meanwhile, as thus with him it fared, 
They for the voyage were prepared. 
And went to the sea-shore: 
But, when they thither came, the youth 
Deserted his poor bride, and Ruth 
Could never find him more. 

God help thee, Ruth ! — Such pains she had 

That she in half a year was mad 

And in a prison housed; 

And there, with many a doleful song 

Made of wild words, her cup of wrong 

She fearfully caroused. 

Yet sometimes milder hours she knew, 
Nor wanted sun, nor rain, nor dew, 
Nor pastimes of the May, 
— They all were with her in her cell; 
And a clear brook with cheerful knell 
Did o'er the pebbles play. 



BOOK FOURTH 455 

When Ruth three seasons thus had lain, 
There came a respite to her pain; 
She from her prison fled; 
But of the Vagrant none took thought; 
And where it liked her best she sought 
Her shelter and her bread. 

Among the fields she breathed again: 
The master-current of her brain 
Ran permanent and free; 
And, coming to the banks of Tone, 
There did she rest; and dwell alone 
Under the greenwood tree. 

The engines of her pain, the tools 

That shaped her sorrow, rocks and pools. 

And airs that gently stir 

The vernal leaves — she loved them still, 

Nor ever tax'd them with the ill 

Which had been done to her. 

A barn her Winter bed supplies; 

But, till the warmth of Summer skies 

And Summer days is gone, 

(And all do in this tale agree) 

She sleeps beneath the greenwood tree. 

And other home hath none. 

An innocent life, yet far astray! 

And Ruth will, long before her day, 

Be broken down and old. • 



456 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Sore aches she needs must have! but less 
Of mind, than body's wretchedness, 
From damp, and rain, and cold. 

If she is prest by want of food 

She from her dwelling in the wood 

Repairs to a road-side; 

And there she begs at one steep place, 

Where up and down with easy pace 

The horsemen-travellers ride. 

That oaten pipe of hers is mute 
Or thrown away: but with a flute 
Her loneliness she cheers; 
This flute, made of a hemlock stalk, 
At evening in his homeward walk 
The Quantock woodman hears. 

I, too, have pass'd her on the hills 

Setting her little water-mills 

By spouts and fountains wild — 

Such small machinery as she turn'd 

Ere she had wept, ere she had mourn'd, - 

A young and happy child ! 

Farewell ! and when thy days are told, 

Ill-fated Ruth! in hallow'd mould 

Thy corpse shall buried be; 

For thee a funeral bell shall ring, 

And all the congregation sing 

A Christian psalm for thee. 

W. Wordsivorth 



BOOK FOURTH 457 

CCCXXI 

WRITTEN AMONG THE 
EUGANEAN HILLS 

Many a green isle needs must be 

In the deep wide sea of Misery, 

Or the mariner, worn and wan, 

Never thus could voyage on 

Day and night, and night and day, 

Drifting on his dreary way. 

With the solid darkness black 

Closing round his vessel's track; 

Whilst above, the sunless sky 

Big with clouds, hangs heavily, 

And behind the tempest fleet 

Hurries on with lightning feet. 

Riving sail, and cord, and plank, 

Till the ship has almost drank 

Death from the o'er-brimming deep; 

And sinks down, down, like that sleep 

When the dreamer seems to be 

Weltering through eternity; 

And the dim low line before 

Of a dark and distant shore 

Still recedes, as ever still 

Longing with divided will. 

But no power to seek or shun. 

He is ever drifted on 

O'er the unreposing wave, 

To the haven of the grave. ' 



458 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Ah, many flowering islands lie 
In the waters of wide Agony: 
To such a one this morn was led 
My bark, by soft winds piloted. 
— 'Mid the mountains Euganean 
I stood listening to the paean 
With which the legion'd rooks did hail 
The Sun's uprise majestical: 
Gathering round with wings all hoar, 
Through the dewy mist they soar 
Like gray shades, till the eastern heaven 
Bursts; and then, — as clouds of even 
Fleck'd with fire and azure, lie 
In the unfathomable sky, — 
So their plumes of purple grain 
Starr'd with drops of golden rain 
Gleam above the sunlight woods, 
As in silent multitudes 
On the morning's fitful gale 
Through the broken mist they sail; 
And the vapours cloven and gleaming 
Follow down the dark steep streaming, 
Till all is bright, and clear, and still 
Round the solitary hill. 

Beneath is spread like a green sea 
The waveless plain of Lombardy, 
Bounded by the vaporous air, 
Islanded by cities fair; 
Underneath Day's azure eyes, 
Ocean's nursling, Venice lies, — 



BOOK FOURTH 459 

A peopled labyrinth of walls, 
Amphitrite's destined halls, 
Which her hoary sire now paves 
With his blue and beaming waves. 
Lo! the sun upsprings behind. 
Broad, red, radiant, half-reclined 
On the level quivering line 
Of the waters crystalline; 
And before that chasm of light, 
As within a furnace bright, 
Column, tower, and dome, and spire, 
Shine like obelisks of fire. 
Pointing with inconstant motion 
From the altar of dark ocean 
To the sapphire-tinted skies; 
As the flames of sacrifice 
From the marble shrines did rise 
As to pierce the dome of gold 
Where Apollo spoke of old. 

Sun-girt City! thou hast been 
Ocean's child, and then his queen; 
Now is come a darker day. 
And thou soon must be his prey, 
If the power that raised thee here 
Hallow so thy watery bier. 
A less drear ruin then than now, 
With thy conquest-branded brow 
Stooping to the slave of slaves 
From thy throne among the waves 
Wilt thou be, — when the sea-mew 



460 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Flies, as once before it flew, 
O'er thine isles depopulate. 
And all is in its ancient state. 
Save where many a palace-gate 
With green sea-flowers overgrown 
Like a rock of ocean's own, 
Topples o'er the abandon'd sea 
As the tides change sullenly. 
The fisher on his watery way 
Wandering at the close of day. 
Will spread his sail and seize his oar 
Till he pass the gloomy shore, 
Lest thy dead should, from their sleep, 
Bursting o'er the starlight deep, 
Lead a rapid masque of death 
O'er the waters of his path. 

Noon descends around me now : 
'Tis the noon of autumn's glow, 
When a soft and purple mist 
Like a vaporous amethyst. 
Or an air-dissolved star 
Mingling light and fragrance, far 
From the curved horizon's bound 
To the point of heaven's profound, 
Fills the overflowing sky; 
And the plains that silent lie 
Underneath; the leaves unsodden 
Where the infant Frost has trodden 
With his morning-winged feet 
Whose bright print is gleaming yet; 



BOOK FOURTH 461 

And the red and golden vines 

Piercing with their treUised Hnes 

The rough, dark-skirted wilderness; 

The dun and bladed grass no less, 

Pointing from this hoary tower 

In the windless air; the flower 

Glimmering at my feet; the line 

Of the olive-sandall'd Apennine 

In the south dimly islanded; 

And the Alps, whose snows are spread 

High between the clouds and sun; 

And of living things each one; 

And my spirit, which so long 

Darken'd this swift stream of song, — 

Interpenetrated lie 

By the glory of the sky; 

Be it love, light, harmony, 

Odour, or the soul of all 

Which from heaven like dew doth fall, 

Or the mind which feeds this verse, 

Peopling the lone universe. 

Noon descends, and after noon 
Autumn's evening meets me soon. 
Leading the infantine moon 
And that one star, which to her 
Almost seems to minister 
Half the crimson light she brings 
From the sunset's radiant springs: 
And the soft dreams of the morn 
(Which like winged winds had borne 



462 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

To that silent isle, which lies 
'Mid remember'd agonies, 
The frail bark of this lone being), 
Pass, to other sufferers fleeing, 
And its ancient pilot. Pain, 
Sits beside the helm again. 

Other flowering isles must be 
In the sea of Life and Agony: 
Other spirits float and flee 
O'er that gulf: Ev'n now, perhaps. 
On some rock the wild wave wraps, 
With folded wings they waiting sit 
For my bark, to pilot it 
To some calm and blooming cove; 
Where for me, and those I love, 
May a windless bower be built, 
Far from passion, pain, and guilt, 
In a dell 'mid lawny hills 
Which the wild sea-murmur fills, 
And soft sunshine, and the sound 
Of old forests echoing round. 
And the light and smell divine 
Of all flowers that breathe and shine, 
— We may live so happy there, 
That the Spirits of the Air 
Envying us, may ev'n entice 
To our healing paradise 
The polluting multitude : 
But their rage would be subdued 
By that clime divine and calm. 



BOOK FOURTH 463 

And the winds whose wings rain balm 

On the upUfted soul, and leaves 

Under which the bright sea heaves; 

While each breathless interval 

In their whisperings musical 

The inspired soul suppHes 

With its own deep melodies; 

And the Love which heals all strife 

Circling, like the breath of life, 

All things in that sweet abode 

With its own mild brotherhood : — 

They, not it, would change; and soon 

Every sprite beneath the moon 

Would repent its envy vain, 

And the Earth grow young again. 

P. B. Shelley 

CCCXXII 

ODE TO THE WEST WIND 

O WILD West Wind, thou breath of Autumn's being, 

Thou, from whose unseen presence the leaves dead 

Are driven, like ghosts from an enchanter fleeing, 

Yellow, and black, and pale, and hectic red, 

Pestilence-stricken multitudes! O thou 

Who chariotest to their dark wintry bed 

The winged seeds, where they lie cold and low, 

Each like a corpse within its grave, until 

Thine azure sister of the Spring shall blow 

Her clarion o'er the dreaming earth, and fill 

(Driving sweet buds like flocks to feed in air) 



464 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

With living hues and odours plain and hill: 
Wild Spirit, which art moving everywhere; 
Destroyer and Preserver; Hear, oh hear! 

Thou on whose stream, 'mid the steep sky's com- 
motion, 
Loose clouds like earth's decaying leaves are shed, 
Shook from the tangled boughs of heaven and ocean, 
Angels of rain and lightning! there are spread 
On the blue surface of thine airy surge. 
Like the bright hair uplifted from the head 
Of some fierce Maenad, ev'n from the dim verge 
Of the horizon to the zenith's height — 
The locks of the approaching storm. Thou dirge 
Of the dying year, to which this closing night 
Will be the dome of a vast sepulchre. 
Vaulted with all thy congregated might 
Of vapours, from whose solid atmosphere 
Black rain, and fire, and hail, will burst: Oh hear! 

Thou who didst waken from his summer-dreams 
The blue Mediterranean, where he lay, 
Lull'd by the coil of his crystalline streams, 
Beside a pumice isle in Baiae's bay. 
And saw in sleep old palaces and towers 
Quivering within the wave's intenser day, 
All overgrown with azure moss, and flowers 
So sweet, the sense faints picturing them! Thou 
For whose path the Atlantic's level powers 
Cleave themselves into chasms, while far below 
The sea-blooms and the oozy woods which wear 



BOOK FOURTH ' 465 

The sapless foliage of the ocean, know 

Thy voice, and suddenly grow gray with fear 

And tremble and despoil themselves: Oh hear! 

If I were a dead leaf thou mightest bear; 
If I were a swift cloud to fly with thee; 
A wave to pant beneath thy power, and share 
The impulse of thy strength, only less free 
Than Thou, O uncontrollable! If even 
I were as in my boyhood, and could be 
The comrade of thy wanderings over heaven, 
As then, when to outstrip thy skiey speed 
Scarce scem'd a vision, — I would ne'er have striven 
As thus with thee in prayer in my sore need. 
Oh ! lift me as a wave, a leaf, a cloud ! 
I fall upon the thorns of life ! I bleed ! 
A heavy weight of hours has chain 'd and bow'd 
One too like thee — tameless, and swift, and proud. 

Make me thy lyre, ev'n as the forest is: 
What if my leaves are falling hke its own! 
The tumult of thy mighty harmonies 
Will take from both a deep autumnal tone, 
Sweet though in sadness. Be thou, Spirit fierce, 
My spirit! be thou me, impetuous one! 
Drive my dead thoughts over the universe. 
Like wither'd leaves, to quicken a new birth; 
And, by the incantation of this verse, 
Scatter, as from an unextinguish'd hearth 
Ashes and sparks, my words among mankind! 
Be through my lips to unawaken'd earth 



466 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

The trumpet of a prophecy! O Wind, 

If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind? 

P. B, Shelley 

CCCXXIII 

NATURE AND THE POET 

Suggested by a Picture of Peele Castle in a Storm, 
painted by Sir George Beaumont 

I WAS thy neighbour once, thou rugged Pile ! 
Four summer weeks I dwelt in sight of thee: 
I saw thee every day; and all the while 
Thy Form was sleeping on a glassy sea. 

So pure the sky, so quiet was the air! 
So hke, so very like, was day to day! 
Whene'er I look'd thy image still was there; 
It trembled, but it never pass'd away. 

How perfect was the calm! It seem'd no sleep, 
No mood, which season takes away, or brings: 
I could have fancied that the mighty Deep 
Was even the gentlest of all gentle things. 

Ah! then — if mine had been the painter's hand 
To express what then I saw; and add the gleam, 
The light that never was on sea or land. 
The consecration, and the Poet's dream, — 

I would have planted thee, thou hoary pile. 
Amid a world how different from this! 



BOOK FOURTH 467 

Beside a sea that could not cease to smile; 
On tranquil land, beneath a sky of bhss. 

Thou shouldst have seem'd a treasure-house divine 
Of peaceful years; a chronicle of heaven; — 
Of all the sunbeams that did ever shine 
The very sweetest had to thee been given. 

'A picture had it been of lasting ease, 
Elysian quiet, without toil or strife; 
No motion but the moving tide; a breeze; 
Or merely silent Nature's breathing life. 

Such, in the fond illusion of my heart, 

Such picture would I at that time have made; 

And seen the soul of truth in every part, 

A steadfast peace that might not be betray'd. 

So once it would have been, — 'tis so no more; 
I have submitted to a new control : 
A power is gone, which nothing can restore; 
A deep distress hath humanized my soul. 

Not for a moment could I now behold 
A smiling sea, and be what I have been: 
The feeling of my loss will ne'er be old; 
This, which I know, I speak with mind serene. 

Then, Beaumont, Friend! who would have been the 

friend 
If he had lived, of Him whom I deplore, 



468 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

This work of thine I blame not, but commend; 
This sea in anger, and that dismal shore. 

'tis a passionate work ! — yet wise and well, 
Well chosen is the spirit that is here; 

That hulk which labours in the deadly swell, 
This rueful sky, this pageantry of fear! 

And this huge Castle, standing here sublime, 

1 love to see the look with which it braves, 

— Cased in the unfeeling armour of old time — 
The lightning, the fierce wind, and trampling waves. 

— Farewell, farewell the heart that lives alone, 
Housed in a dream, at distance from the Kind! 
Such happiness, wherever it be known, 

Is to be pitied; for 'tis surely blind. 

But welcome fortitude, and patient cheer. 
And frequent sights of what is to be borne! 
Such sights, or worse, as are before me here : — 
Not without hope we suffer and we mourn. 

W. Wordsworth 

CCCXXIV 

THE POET'S DREAM 

On a Poet's lips I slept 
Dreaming like a love-adept 
In the sound his breathing kept; 
Nor seeks nor finds he mortal blisses, 
But feeds on the aerial kisses 



BOOK FOURTH 469 

Of shapes that haunt Thought's wildernesses. 
He will watch from dawn to gloom 
The lake-reflected sun illume 
The yellow bees in the ivy-bloom, 

Nor heed nor see what things they be — 
But from these create he can 
Forms more real than living Man, 

Nurslings of ImmortaUty! 

P, B. Shelley 



CCCXXV 

GLEN-ALMAIN, THE NARROW GLEN 

In this still place, remote from men, 

Sleeps Ossian, in the Narrow Glen; 

In this still place, where murmurs on 

But one meek streamlet, only one: 

He sang of battles, and the breath 

Of stormy war, and violent death ; 

And should, methinks, when all was past. 

Have rightfully been laid at last 

Where rocks were rudely heap'd, and rent 

As by a spirit turbulent; 

Where sights were rough, and sounds were wild, 

And everything unreconciled; 

In some complaining, dim retreat, 

For fear and melancholy meet; 

But this is calm; there cannot be 

A more entire tranquillity. • 



470 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

Does then the Bard sleep here mdeed? 
Or is it but a groundless creed? 
What matters it? — I blame them not 
Whose fancy in this lonely spot 
Was moved; and in such way express'd 
Their notion of its perfect rest. 
A convent, even a hermit's cell, 
Would break the silence of this Dell; 
It is not quiet, is not ease; 
But something deeper far than these : 
The separation that is here 
Is of the grave; and of austere 
Yet happy feelings of the dead : 
And, therefore, was it rightly said 
That Ossian, last of all his race! 
Lies buried in this lonely place. 

W. Wordsworth 



CCCXXVI 

The World is too much with us; late and soon, 
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers; 
Little we see in Nature that is ours; 
We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon! 

This Sea that bares her bosom to the moon. 
The winds that will be howling at all hours 
And are up-gather'd now like sleeping flowers, 
For this, for every thing, we are out of tune; 



BOOK FOURTH 471 

It moves us not. — Great God! I'd rather be 
A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn, — 
So might I, standing on this pleasant lea, 

Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn; 
Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea; 
Or hear old Triton blow his wreathed horn. 

W. Wordsworth 

CCCXXVII 

WITHIN KING'S COLLEGE CHAPEL 
CAMBRIDGE 

Tax not the royal Saint with vain expense, 
With ill-match'd aims the Architect who plann'd 
(Albeit labouring for a scanty band 
Of white-robed Scholars only) this immense 

And glorious work of fine intelligence! 

— Give all thou canst; high Heaven rejects the lore 

Of nicely-calculated less or more : — 

So deem'd the man who fashion'd for the sense 

These lofty pillars, spread that branching roof 
Self-poised, and scoop'd into ten thousand cells 
Where light and shade repose, where music dwells 

Lingering — and wandering on as loth to die ; 
Like thoughts whose very sweetness yieldeth proof 
That they were born for immortality. 

W. Wordsworth 



472 THE GOLDM TREASURY 

CCCXXVIII 
ODE ON A GRECIAN URN 

Thou still unravish'd bride of quietness, 

Thou foster-child of silence and slow time, 
Sylvan historian, who canst thus express 

A flowery tale more sweetly than our rhyme: 
What leaf-fringed legend haunts about thy shape 

Of deities or mortals, or of both. 
In Tempe or the dales of Arcady? 
What men or gods are these? What maidens loth? 

What mad pursuit? What struggle to escape? 
What pipes and timbrels? What wild ecstasy? 

Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard 

Are sweeter; therefore, ye soft pipes, play on; 
Not to the sensual ear, but, more endear'd, 

Pipe to the spirit ditties of no tone : 
Fair youth, beneath the trees, thou canst not leave 

Thy song, nor ever can those trees be bare; 
Bold Lover, never, never canst thou kiss. 
Though wimiing near the goal — yet, do not grieve; 

She cannot fade, though thou hast not thy bliss, 
For ever wilt thou love, and she be fair! 

Ah, happy, happy boughs! that cannot shed 
Your leaves, nor ever bid the Spring adieu; 

And, happy melodist, unwearied. 
For ever piping songs for ever new; 

More happy love! more happy, happy love! 
For ever warm and still to be enjoy'd, 



BOOK FOURTH ^73 

For ever panting, and for ever young; 
All breathing human passion far above, 

That leaves a heart high-sorrowful and cloy'd, 
A burning forehead, and a parching tongue. 

Who are these coming to the sacrifice? 

To what green altar, mysterious priest, 
Lead'st thou that heifer lowing at the skies, 

And all her silken flanks with garlands drest? 
What little town by river or sea shore, 

Or mountain-built with peaceful citadel. 
Is emptied of this folk, this pious morn? 
And, little town, thy streets for evermore 

Will silent be; and not a soul to tell 
Why thou art desolate, can e'er return. 

O Attic shape! Fair attitude! with brede 

Of marble men and maidens overwrought, 
With forest branches and the trodden weed; 

Thou, silent form, dost tease us out of thought 
As doth eternity: Cold Pastoral! 

When old age shall this generation waste, 
Thou shalt remain, in midst of other woe 
Than ours, a friend to man, to whom thou say'st, 
'Beauty is truth, truth beauty,' — that is all 
Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know. 

J. Keats 



474 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

CCCXXIX 

YOUTH AND AGE 

Verse, a breeze 'mid blossoms straying, 
Where Hope clung feeding, like a bee — 
Both were mine! Life went a-maying 
With Nature, Hope, and Poesy, 
When I was young! 
When I was young? — Ah, woful when! 
Ah! for the change 'twixt Now and Then! 
This breathing house not built with hands, 
This body that does me grievous wrong. 
O'er aery cliffs and glittering sands 
How lightly then it flash'd along: 
Like those trim skiffs, unknown of yore, 
On winding lakes and rivers wide. 
That ask no aid of sail or oar. 
That fear no spite of wind or tide ! 
Nought cared this body for wind or weather 
When Youth and I lived in't together. 

Flowers are lovely; Love is flower-Hke; 
Friendship is a sheltering tree; 
O! the joys, that came down shower-like, 
Of Friendship, Love, and Liberty, 

Ere I was old ! 
Ere I was old? Ah woful Ere, 
Which tells me. Youth's no longer here! 
O Youth ! for years so many and sweet, 
'Tis known that Thou and I were one, 
I'll think it but a fond conceit — 



BOOK FOURTH 475 

It cannot be, that Thou art gone! 
Thy vesper-bell hath not yet toll'd : — 
And thou wert aye a masker bold! 
What strange disguise hast now put on 
To make believe that Thou art gone? 
I see these locks in silvery slips, 
This drooping gait, this alter'd size: 
But Springtide blossoms on thy lips, 
And tears take sunshine from thine eyes! 
Life is but Thought : so think I will 
That Youth and I are house-mates still. 

Dew-drops are the gems of morning, 
But the tears of mournful eve! 
Where no hope is, life's a warning 
That only serves to make us grieve 

When we are old : 
— That only serves to make us grieve 
With oft and tedious taking-leave. 
Like some poor nigh-related guest 
That may not rudely be dismist. 
Yet hath out-stay'd his welcome while, 
And tells the jest without the smile. 

S. T. Coleridge 



cccxxx 

THE TWO APRIL MORNINGS 

We walk'd along, while bright and red 
Uprose the morning sun; 



476 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

And Matthew stopp'd, he look'd, and said 
'The will of God be done!' 

A village schoolmaster was he, 
With hair of glittering gray; 
As blithe a man as you could see 
On a spring hohday. 

And on that morning, through the grass 
And by the steaming rills 
We traveird merrily, to pass 
A day among the hills. 

'Our work,' said I, ' was well begun; 
Then, from thy breast what thought, 
Beneath so beautiful a sun. 
So sad a sigh has brought? ' 

A second time did Matthew stop; 
And fixing still his eye 
Upon the eastern mountain-top, 
To me he made reply: 

' Yon cloud with that long purple cleft 
Brings fresh into my mind 
A day like this, which I have left 
Full thirty years behind. 

'And just a])ove yon slope of corn 
Such colours, and no other, 
Were in the sky that April morn, 
Of this the very brother. 



BOOK FOURTH 477 

'With rod and line I sued the sport 
Which that sweet season gave, 
And to the church-yard come, stopp'd short 
Beside my daughter's grave. 

'Nine summers had she scarcely seen, 
The pride of all the vale; 
And then she sang, — she would have been 
A very nightingale. 

' Six feet in earth my Emma lay; 
And yet I loved her more — 
For so it seem'd, — than till that day 
I e'er had loved before. 

'And turning from her grave, I met, 
Beside the churchyard yew, 
A blooming Girl, whose hair was wet 
With points of morning dew. 

'A basket on her head she bare; 
Her brow was smooth and white: 
To see a child so very fair, 
It was a pure delight ! 

^ No fountain from its rocky cave 
E'er tripp'd with foot so free; 
She seem'd as happy as a wave 
That dances on the sea. 

' There came from me a sigh of pain 
Which I could ill confine; • 



478 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

I look'd at her, and look'd again: 
And did not wish her mine ! ' 

— Matthew is in his grave, yet now 
Methinks I see him stand 
As at that moment, with a bough 
Of wilding in his hand. 

W. Wordsworth 

CCCXXXI 
THE FOUNTAIN 
A Conversation 
We talk'd with open heart, and tongue 
Affectionate and true, 
A pair of friends, though I was young, 
And Matthew seventy-two. 

We lay beneath a spreading oak, 
Beside a mossy seat; 
And from the turf a fountain broke 
And gurgled at our feet. 

'Now, Matthew!' said I, ' let us match 
This water's pleasant tune 
With some old border-song, or catch 
That suits a summer's noon; 

' Or of the church-clock and the chimes 
Sing here beneath the shade 
That half-mad thing of witty rhymes 
Which you last April made!' 



BOOK FOURTH 479 

In silence Matthew lay, and eyed 
The spring beneath the tree; 
And thus the dear old man replied, 
The gray-hair'd man of glee : 

' No check, no stay, this Streamlet fears, 
How merrily it goes! 
'Twill murmur on a thousand years 
And flow as now it flows. 

'And here, on this delightful day, 
I cannot choose but think 
How oft, a vigorous man, I lay 
Beside this fountain's brink. 

'My eyes are dim with childish tears, 
My heart is idly stirr'd. 
For the same sound is in my ears 
Which in those days I heard. 

'Thus fares it still in our decay: 
And yet the wiser mind 
Mourns less for what Age takes away. 
Than what it leaves behind. 

'The blackbird amid leafy trees, 
The lark above the hill. 
Let loose their carols when they please. 
Are quiet when they will. 

'With Nature never do they wage 

A foolish strife; they see • 



480 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

A happy youth, and their old age 
Is beautiful and free: 

'But we are press'd by heavy laws; 
And often, glad no more, 
We wear a face of joy because 
We have been glad of yore. 

* If there be one who need bemoan 
His kindred laid in earth, 
The household hearts that were his own, 
It is the man of mirth. 

*My days, my friend, are almost gone, 
My life has been approved. 
And many love me; but by none 
Am I enough beloved.' 

'Now both himself and me he wrongs, 
The man who thus complains! 
I live and sing my idle songs 
Upon these happy plains: 

'And Matthew, for thy children dead 
I'll be a son to thee!' 
At this he grasp'd my hand and said, 
'Alas! that cannot be.' 

— We rose up from the fountain-side; 
And down the smooth descent 
Of the green sheep-track did we glide; 
And through the wood we went; 



BOOK FOURTH 481 

And ere we came to Leonard's rock 
He sang those witty rhymes 
About the crazy old church-clock, 
And the bewildered chimes. 

W. Wordsworth 

CCCXXXII 
THE RIVER OF LIFE 

The more we live, more brief appear 

Our life's succeeding stages: 
A day to childhood seems a year, 

And years like passing ages. 

The gladsome current of our youth, 

Ere passion yet disorders. 
Steals lingering like a river smooth 

Along its grassy borders. 

But as the care-worn cheek grows wan, 

And sorrow's shafts fly thicker, 
Ye Stars, that measure life to man. 

Why seem your courses quicker? 

When joys have lost their bloom and breath 

And life itself is vapid, 
Why, as we reach the Falls of Death, 

Feel we its tide more rapid? 

It may be strange — yet who would change 
Time's course to slower speeding, 



482 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

When one by one our friends have gone 
And left our bosoms bleeding? 

Heaven gives our years of fading strength 

Indemnifying fleetness; 
And those of youth, a seeming length, 

Proportion'd to their sweetness. 

T. Campbell 

CCCXXXIII 

THE HUMAN SEASONS 

Four Seasons fill the measure of the year; 
There are four seasons in the mind of man : Ql^ 
He has his lusty Spring, when fancy clear A \ 
Takes in all beauty with an easy span: 

He has his Summer, when luxuriously 

Spring's honey'd cud of youthful thought he loves 

To ruminate, and by such dreaming high 

Is nearest unto heaven : quiet coves 

His soul has in its Autumn, when his wings 
He furleth close; contented so to look 
On mists in idleness — to let fair things 
Pass by unheeded as a threshold brook. 

He has his Winter too of pale misfeature. 
Or else he would forego his mortal nature. 

J. Keats 



BOOK FOURTH 483 

/ 

CCCXXXIV 
A DIRGE 

Rough wind, that moanest loud 

Grief too sad for song; 
Wild wind, when sullen cloud 

Knells all the night long; 
Sad storm whose tears are vain, 
Bare woods whose branches stain, 
Deep caves and dreary main, — 

Wail for the world's wrong! 

P. B. Shelley 

. : cccxxxv 

7 

THRENOS 

World! O Life! O Time! 
On whose last steps I climb. 

Trembling at that where I had stood before; 
When will return the glory of your prime? 
No more — Oh, never more! 

Out of the day and night 
A joy has taken flight: 

Fresh spring, and summer, and winter hoar 
Move my faint heart with grief; but with delight 
No more — Oh, never more ! 

P. B. Shelley 



484 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

CCCXXXVI 

THE TROSACHS 

There's not a nook within this solemn Pass, 
But were an apt confessional for One 
Taught by his summer spent, his autumn gone, 
That Life is but a tale of morning grass 

Wither'd at eve. From scenes of art which chase 
That thought away, turn, and with watchful eyes 
Feed it 'mid Nature's old felicities. 
Rocks, rivers, and smooth lakes more clear than glass 

Untouch'd, unbreathed upon: — Thrice happy quest, 
If from a golden perch of aspen spray 
(October's workmanship to rival May), 

The pensive warbler of the ruddy breast 
That moral sweeten by a heaven-taught lay, 
Lulling the year, with all its cares, to rest! 

W. Wordsworth 

CCCXXXVII 

My heart leaps up when I behold 

A rainbow in the sky : 
So was it when my life began, 
So is it now I am a man. 
So be it when I shall grow old 

Or let me die! 
The Child is father of the Man: 



BOOK FOURTH 485 

And I could wish my days to be 
Bound each to each by natural piety. 

W. Wordsworth 

CCCXXXVIII 

ODE ON INTIMATIONS OF IMMORTALITY 

FROM RECOLLECTIONS OF EARLY 

CHILDHOOD 

There was a time when meadow, grove, and stream, 
The earth, and every common sight 
To me did seem 
Appareird in celestial light, 
The glory and the freshness of a dream. 
It is not now as it hath been of yore; — 
Turn wheresoe'er I may. 
By night or day, 
The things which I have seen I now can see no more. 

The rainbow comes and goes. 

And lovely is the rose; 

The moon doth with delight 
Look round her when the heavens are bare; 

Waters on a starry night 

Are beautiful and fair; 
The sunshine is a glorious birth; 
But yet I know, where'er I go. 
That there hath past away a glory from the earth. 

Now, while the birds thus sing a joyous song. 
And while the young lambs bound 



486 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

As to the tabor's sound, 
To me alone there came a thought of grief: 
A timely utterance gave that thought relief, 

And I again am strong. 
The cataracts blow their trumpets from the steep; — 
No more shall grief of mine the season wrong : 
I hear the echoes through the mountains throng, 
The winds come to me from the fields of sleep, 
And all the earth is gay; 
Land and sea 
Give themselves up to jollity. 

And with the heart of May 
Doth every beast keep holiday; — 
Thou child of joy 
Shout round me, let me hear thy shouts, thou happy 
Shepherd-boy ! 

Ye blessed Creatures, I have heard the call 

Ye to each other make; I see 
The heavens laugh with you in your jubilee; 
My heart is at your festival. 
My head hath its coronal. 
The fulness of your bliss, I feel — I feel it all. 
Oh evil day! if I were sullen 
While Earth herself is adorning 
This sweet May-morning; 
And the children are culling 

On every side 
In a thousand valleys far and wide, 
Fresh flowers; while the sun shines warm 
And the babe leaps up on his mother's arm : — 



BOOK FOURTH 487 

I hear, I hear, with joy I hear! 
— But there's a tree, of many, one, 
A single field which I have look'd upon. 
Both of them speak of something that is gone: 
The pansy at my feet 
Doth the same tale repeat: 
Whither is fled the visionary gleam? 
Where is it now, the glory and the dream? 

Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting; 
The Soul that rises with us, our life's Star, 
Hath had elsewhere its setting 

And Cometh from afar; 
Not in entire forgetfulness. 
And not in utter nakedness. 
But trailing clouds of glory do we come 

From God, who is our home: 
Heaven Hes about us in our infancy! 
Shades of the prison-house begin to close 

Upon the growing Boy, 
But he beholds the light, and whence it flows. 

He sees it in his joy; 
The Youth, who daily farther from the east 
Must travel, still is Nature's priest, 
And by the vision splendid 
Is on his way attended; 
At length the Man perceives it die away, 
And fade into the light of common day. 

Earth fills her lap with pleasures of her own; 
Yearnings she hath in her own natural kind, 



488 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

And, even with something of a mother's mind 
And no unworthy aim, 
The homely nurse doth all she can 

To make her foster-child, her inmate, Man, 

Forget the glories he hath known, 

And that imperial palace whence he came. 

Behold the Child among his new-born blisses, 
A six years' darling of a pigmy size! 
See, where 'mid work of his own hand he lies, 
Fretted by sallies of his mother's kisses, 
With light upon him from his father's eyes! 
See, at his feet, some little plan or chart, 
Some fragment from his dream of human life. 
Shaped by himself with newly-learned art; 

A wedding or a festival, 

A mourning or a funeral ; 

And this hath now his heart. 

And unto this he frames his song: 
Then will he fit his tongue 
To dialogues of business, love, or strife; 

But it will not be long 

Ere this be thrown aside. 

And with new joy and pride 
The little actor cons another part; 
Filling from time to time his 'humorous stage' 
With all the Persons, down to palsied Age, 
That life brings with her in her equipage; 

As if his whole vocation 

Were endless imitation. 



BOOK FOURTH 489 

Thou, whose exterior semblance doth behe 

Thy souFs immensity; 
Thou best philosopher, who yet dost keep 
Thy heritage, thou eye among the blind, 
That, deaf and silent, read'st the eternal deep, 
Haunted for ever by the eternal Mind, — 

Mighty Prophet! Seer blest! 

On whom those truths do rest 
Which we are toiling all our lives to find. 
In darkness lost, the darkness of the grave; 
Thou, over whom thy Immortality 
Broods like the day, a master o'er a slave, 
A Presence which is not to be put by; 
Thou little child, yet glorious in the might 
Of heaven-born freedom on thy being's height, 
Why with such earnest pains dost thou provoke 
The years to bring the inevitable yoke. 
Thus blindly with thy blessedness at strife? 
Full soon thy soul shall have her earthly freight, 
And custom lie upon thee with a weight 
Heavy as frost, and deep almost as hfe! 

O joy! that in our embers 

Is something that doth live, 

That Nature yet remembers 

What was so fugitive! 
The thought of our past years in me doth breed 
Perpetual benediction : not indeed 
For that which is most worthy to be blest, 
Delight and liberty, the simple creed 
Of Childhood, whether busy or at rest. 



490 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

With new-fledged hope still fluttering in his breast: 
— Not for these I raise 
The song of thanks and praise; 
But for those obstinate questionings 
Of sense and outward things, 
Fallings from us, vanishings; 
Blank misgivings of a creature 
Moving about in worlds not realized, 
High instincts, before which our mortal nature 
Did tremble like a guilty thing surprized: 
But for those first affections, 
Those shadowy recollections, 

Which, be they what they may, 
Are yet the fountain-light of all our day. 
Are yet a master-light of all our seeing; 

Uphold us, cherish, and have power to make 
Our noisy years seem moments in the being 
Of the eternal Silence : truths that wake. 

To perish never; 
Which neither listlessness, nor mad endeavour, 

Nor man nor boy 
Nor all that is at enmity with joy. 
Can utterly abolish or destroy! 

Hence, in a season of calm weather 
Though inland far we be, 
Our souls have sight of that immortal sea 
Which brought us hither; 
Can in a moment travel thither — 
And see the childrtm sport upon the shore. 
And hear the mighty waters rolling evermore. 



BOOK FOURTH 491 

Then, sing ye birds, sing, sing a joyous song! 

And let the young lambs bound 

As to the tabor's sound! 
We, in thought, will join your throng 

Ye that pipe and ye that play. 

Ye that through your hearts to-day 

Feel the gladness of the May! 
What though the radiance which was once so bright 
Be now for ever taken from my sight, 

Though nothing can bring back the hour 
Of splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower; 

We will grieve not, rather find 

Strength in what remains behind; 

In the primal sympathy 

Which haying been must ever be; 

In the soothing thoughts that spring 

Out of human suffering; 

In the faith that looks through death, 
In years that bring the philosophic mind. 

And 0, ye Fountains, Meadows, Hills, and Groves, 

Forbode not any severing of our loves! 

Yet in my heart of hearts I feel your might; 

I only have relinquish'd one delight 

To live beneath your more habitual sway: 

I love the brooks which down their channels fret 

Even more than when I tripp'd lightly as they: 

The innocent brightness of a new-born day 

Is lovely yet; 
The clouds that gather round the setting sun 
Do take a sober colouring from an eye 



492 THE GOLDEN TREASURY 

That hath kept watch o'er man's mortality; 
Another race hath been, and other palms are won. 
Thanks to the human heart by which we live, 
Thanks to its tenderness, its joys, and fears, 
To me the meanest flower that blows can give 
Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears. 

W. Wordsworth 

CCCXXXIX 

Music, when soft voices die, 
Vibrates in the memory — 
Odours, when sweet violets sicken. 
Live within the sense they quicken. 

Rose leaves, when the rose is dead. 

Are heap'd for the beloved's bed; 

And so thy thoughts, when Thou art gone, 

Love itself shall slumber on. 

P. B. Shelley 



NOTES 

Els rhv Xeifiwva Kadlaas, etc. "Sitting down in the meadow, he 
plucked spoils of flowers, one after another, winning them with 
delighted soul." Quoted by Plutarch in his M or alia from a lost 
play of Euripides, Hypsipyle. 

Summary of Book First 

The EUzabethan Poetry, as it is rather vaguely termed, forms 
the substance of this Book, which contains pieces from Wyat 
under Henry VIII to Shakespeare midway through the reign 
of James I, and Drummond who carried on the early manner 
to a still later period. There is here a wide range of style; — 
from simplicity expressed in a language hardly yet broken-in 
to verse, — through the pastoral fancies and Italian conceits 
of the strictly Elizabethan time, — to the passionate reality of 
Shakespeare: yet a general uniformity of tone prevails. Few 
readers can fail to observe the natural sweetness of the verse, 
the single-hearted straightforwardness of the thoughts: — nor 
less, the limitation of subject to the many phases of one passion, 
which then characterized our lyrical poetry, — unless when, as 
in especial with Shakespeare, the ''purple light of Love" is 
tempered by a spirit of sterner reflection. For the didactic 
verse of the century, although lyrical in form, yet very rarely 
rises to the pervading emotion, the golden cadence, proper to 
the lyric. 

It should be observed that this and the following Summaries 
apply in the main to the Collection here presented, in which 
(besides its restriction to Lyrical Poetry) a strictly representa- 
tive or historical Anthology has not been aimed at. Great 
excellence, in human art as in human character, has from the 
beginning of things been even more uniform than mediocrity, 
by virtue of the closeness of its approach to Nature: — and so 
far as the standard of Excellence kept in view has been attained 
in this volume, a comparative absence of extreme or temporary 
phases in style, a similarity of tone and manner, will be found 
throughout: — something neither modern nor ancient, but true 
and speaking to the heart of man alike throughout all ages. [P.] 

493 



494 NOTES 

33, I. May. Hawthorn blossoms. 

34, II. The Fairy Life. This title, like many in the book, is 
Palgrave's. The two songs are sung by the sprite Ariel, in The 
Tempest. The first (V, i, 88) is in answer to his master Prosperous 
promise "Ere long thou shalt be free!" For the music used in 
Shakespeare's time, see Elson's Shakespeare in Music (p. 184). 
The second (II, i, 375) is one of the magic songs by which Ariel 
invisibly lures the shipwrecked prince Ferdinand to Prospero's cell. 
The four short lines are sung ''dispersedly " by other spirits. 

III. Whist. Hushed, quieted. [P.] 

35, IV, 1. 4. Rouse Memnon's mother. Awaken the Dawn 
from the dark Earth and the clouds where she is resting. This 
is one of that limited class of early myths which may be rea- 
sonably interpreted as representations of natural phenomena. 
Aurora in the old mythology is mother of Memnon (the East), 
and wife of Tithonus (the appearances of Earth and Sky during 
the last hours of Night). She leaves him every morning in 
renewed youth, to prepare the way for Phoebus (the Sun), 
whilst Tithonus remains in perpetual old age and grayness. [P.] 

1. 11. Decore. Decorate. 

1. 27. By Peneus' stream. Phoebus loved the nymph Daphne, 
whom he met by the river Peneus in the vale of Tempe. [P.] 

36, 1. 4. Amphion's lyre. He was said to have built the walls 
of Thebes to the sound of his music. — 1. 12. Night like a 
drunkard reels. Compare Romeo and Juliet, II, iii, 1: "The 
grey-eyed morn smiles," etc. [P.] 

1. 15. Orient. Shining. 

It should be added that three lines, which appeared hope- 
lessly misprinted, have been omitted in this poem. [P.] 

V. Sonnet lxiv. All the sonnets of Shakespeare in this vol- 
ume are selected from a volume of one hundred and fifty-four 
sonnets which he published in 1609. Following a device very 
popular in that day, he arranged these sonnets in sequence, so as 
to form, or to hint at, a story. This story outlines the devotion 
of the poet to a younger man, whom he warmly loves, and whom 
he urges to marry, that his qualities may Hve in his children; 
whom he also proposes to perpetuate in verse; from whom he is 
temporarily estranged, first by rivalry for a woman who is un- 
worthy of them both, later by his friend's favors to another 
poet. (See Dowden's edition of the sonnets, London, 1889.) 
There is no proof that Shakespeare was revealing his own life 
story, as some critics have supposed; all we know is that he has 
left us a remarkable series of poems on the universal subjects of 
friendship and death, love and jealousy. The following notes 
give Shakespeare's numbering of the sonnets, for convenience 
in placing them in the series. 



NOTES 495 

37, 1. 7. Which. Refers to thought; this thought, which cannot 
help weeping to have that which it fears to lose, is hke death. 

VI. Sonnet lxv. — Time's chest: in which he is figuratively 
supposed to lay up past treasures. So in Troilus, III, iii, 145, 
"Time hath a wallet at his back," etc. In the Arcadia, chest 
is used to signify tomb. [P.] 

38, VII. A fine example of the high wrought and conventional 
EUzabethan pastoralism, which it would be unreasonable to 
criticize on the ground of the unshepherdlike or unreal character 
of some images suggested. Stanza 6 was perhaps inserted by 
Izaak Walton. [P.] 

A tune from a MS. of Queen Elizabeth's time is given by 
Elson (p. 307). — Madrigals. Love-songs, especially those fol- 
lowing a certain musical pattern. See New English Dictionary. 

39, VIII. Omnia Vincit. 

Omnia vincit Amor et nos cedamus Amori. 

Virgil, Tenth Eclogue, 1. 69. 

Love conquers all things; and let us 3''ield to love. 

This beautiful lyric is one of several recovered from the very 
rare Elizabethan songbooks, for the publication of which our 
.thanks are due to Mr. A. H. Bullen (1887, 1888). [P.] 

40, IX. From The Passionate Pilgrim; some of which was 
written by Shakespeare. The authorship of this particular selec- 
tion, however, is in doubt. — Brave. Handsomely dressed. 

41, X. The song of Amiens, in As You Like It, II, v, 1. He 
sings one verse as a solo, and all the foresters join in the second. 
The oldest known setting, popular in the seventeenth century, is 
in Elson (p. 63). 

XI. From As You Like It, V, iv, 16; sung by two pages of 
the banished Duke. An old tune (1639) is in Elson (p. 192). 
— Corn-field. Grain-field. 

42, Prime. Full perfection. 

XII. One stanza has been here omitted, in accordance with 
the principle noticed in the preface. Similar omissions occur 
in a few other poems. The more serious abbreviation by which 
it has been attempted to bring Crashaw's "Wishes" and 
Shelley's "Euganean Hills," with one or two more, within the 
scheme of this selection, is commended with much diffidence to 
the judgment of readers acquainted with the original pieces. [P.] 

43, XIII. Via Amoris. The road of love. 

Sidney's poetry is singularly unequal; his short life, his 
frequent absorption in pubHc employment, hindered doubtless 
the development of his genius. His great contemporary fame, 
second only, it appears, to Spenser's, has been hence obscured. 
At times he is heavy and even prosaic; his simplicity is rude and 



496 NOTES 

bare; his verse unmelodious. These, however, are the " defects 
of his merits." In a certain depth and chivalry of feehng, — in 
the rare and noble quality of disinterestedness (to put it in one 
word), — he has no superior, hardly perhaps an equal, amongst 
our poets; and after or beside Shakespeare's sonnets, his "As- 
trophel and Stella," in the editor's judgment, offers the most 
intense and powerful picture of the passion of love in the whole 
range of our poetry. — Hundreds of years. "The very rapture 
of love," says Mr. Ruskin; "a lover like this does not believe 
his mistress can grow old or die." [P.] 
XIV. Sonnet lvii. 

44, XV. Sonnet xcvii. — This time removed. This time of 
absence. 

45, XVI. Sonnet xxix. 

XVII. Sonnet cix. — Qualify. Alter. 

46, Just to the time. True to the time, not changed by 
the time. 

xviii. Sonnet CIV. — Perfumes. Accent the first syllable. 

47, xix. From Lodge's novel Rosalind, on which, in part, 
Shakespeare based his As You Like It. Rosader, a peasant, 
has " ventured to gaze on a princess," and recites this poem 
in her honor. 

Readers who have visited Italy will be reminded of more than 
one picture by this gorgeous vision of beauty, equally sublime 
and pure in its paradisiacal naturalness. Lodge wrote it on a 
voyage to "the Islands of Terceras and the Canaries"; and 
he seems to have caught, in those southern seas, no small portion 
of the qualities which marked the almost contemporary art of 
Venice, — the glory and the glow of Veronese, Titian, or Tin- 
toret. — From the same romance is No. lxxi: a charming pic- 
ture in the purest style of the later Italian Renaissance. — The 
clear is the crystalline or outermost heaven of the old cos- 
mography. [P.] 

48, For a fair there's fairer none. If you desire a Beauty, 
there is none more beautiful than Rosaline. [P.] 

50, XXII. Another gracious lyric from an Elizabethan song- 
book, first reprinted (it is beheved) in Mr. W. J. Linton's Rare 
Poems, in 1883. [P.] 

51, XXIII. Sonnet xviii. Not to his Love in our modern 
sense, but to his friend; as in the following sonnet, and the 
series on pages 43-45. 

That fair thou owest. That beauty thou ownest. [P.] 
When in eternal lines. When thou endurest to all time in 
eternal lines of verse. Shakespeare is not placing his verse 
above that of others; the enduring worth of poetry was com- 
monly assumed by Elizabethan poets. Similar statements are 



NOTES 497 

found in Spenser, Drayton, and Daniel. [Dowden; Shakespeare's 
Sonnets.] 

XXIV. Sonnet cvi. — Wights. People. 

52, And for they look'd. Had they not looked with pro- 
phetic eyes, they would not have had skill enough. 

XXV. Basia. Kisses. 

From one of the three songbooks of T. Campion, who appears 
to have been author of the words which he set to music. His 
merit as a lyrical poet (recognized in his own time, but since 
then forgotten) has been again brought to light by Mr. Bullen's 
taste and research. [P.] 

53, Swerving is his conjecture for changing in the text of 
1601. [P.l 

54, xxvir. Dumain and his friends have taken a vow against 
love; but the friends catch him reading this poem which he has 
composed. Love's Labor's Lost, IV, iii, 101. — Deny himself 
for Jove. Deny that he was Jove. 

55, XXVIII. travail. Labor, — Whan. When. — Assays. Tests 
(of love). — Thine own approved. Thy proved lover. 

56, XXIX. Prejudge. Condemn without trial. 

XXX. In Lacrimas. In tears. — All perfections keep. All 
perfections dwell. 

57, Leave off in time to grieve. Leave off grieving, in time. 

XXXI. Sonnet cxvi. 

The star . . . Whose worth's unknown although his height 
be taken. Apparently, whose stellar influence is uncalculated, 
although his angular altitude from the plane of the astrolabe 
or artificial horizon used by astrologers has been determined. 

A simpler explanation may be derived from the Elizabethan 
use of height for latitude, or positioji at sea, especially with refer- 
ence to a point on shore; hence, " whose value is unknown, 
although its position is seen." 

58, XXXII. This lovely song appears, as here given, in Put- 
tenham's Arte of English Poesie, 1589. A longer and inferior 
form was pubhshed in the Arcadia of 1590; but Puttenham's 
prefatory words clearly assign his version to Sidney's own 
authorship. [P.l 

59, XXXV. 

Carpe diem quam minimum credula postero. Horace, Odes, I. xi. 

Enjoy to-day, trusting very little to the morrow. One of Pal- 
grave's favorite titles, made from a phrase from the Latin poets. 
The song is one sung by Feste, the Clown in Twelfth Night, 
II, iii, 40. 
61, XXXVII. From Love's Labor's Lost, V, ii, 992. It is the 



498 NOTES 

concluding song of the play. — Saw. Proverb, wise saying. — 
Crabs. Crab apples. 

Keel. Keep cooler by stirring round. [P.] More exactly, by 
pouring some cooler liquid in. 

XXXVIII. Sonnet lxxiii. 

62, xxxix. Sonnet xxx. Memory is compared to a court 
of justice (" sessions ") before which the poet calls up his past, 
to judge whether he has paid up his full account of grief for 
friends lost. 

Expense. Loss. [P.] 

63, XL. Baiting-place. Feeding place, 
Prease. Press. [P.] 

Heavy. Sleepy. 
XLi. Sonnet lx. 

64, Nativity, once in the main of light. When a star has 
risen and entered on the full stream of light; — another of the 
astrological phrases no longer familiar. — Crooked eclipses. As 
coming athwart the sun's apparent course. — Wordsworth, 
thinking probably of the " Venus " and the " Lucrece," said 
finely of Shakespeare: " Shakespeare could not have written 
an epic; he would have died of plethora of thought." This 
prodigality of nature is exemplified equally in his sonnets. 
The copious selection here given (which from the wealth of the 
material, required greater consideration than any other portion 
of the editor's task), — contains many that will not be fully 
felt and understood without some earnestness of thought on 
the reader's part. But he is not likely to regret the labor. [P.] 

XLii. Sonnet lxxxvii. Another legal sonnet. The loved 
one is found to be too valuable for the poet to possess, his bonds, 
or right of ownership, being limited by his deserts, so that his 
" patent " or title becomes void on the true worth of the object 
becoming known. This is one of the series in which the poet 
fancies himself supplanted by a rival, in his friend's favor. 

Upon misprision growing. Either, granted in error, or, on 
the growth of contempt. [P.] 

65, XLiii. Sonnet xciv. 

With the tone of this sonnet compare Hamlet's " Give me 
that man That is not passion's slave," etc. Shakespeare's writ- 
ings show the deepest sensitiveness to passion: — hence the 
attraction he felt in the contrasting effects of apathy. [P.] 

66, XLiv. Grame. Sorrow. Renaissance influences long im- 
peded the return of English poets to the charming realism of 
this and a few other poems by Wyat. [P.] 

67, XLV, 1. 20. Pandion in the ancient fable was father to 
Philomela. [P.l 

68, XLVi. Approve. Prove. 



NOTES 499 

XLVii. In the old legend it is now Philomela, now Procne 
(the swallow) who suffers violence from Tereus. This song 
has a fascination in its calm intensity of passion; that "sad 
earnestness and vivid exactness " which Cardinal Newman 
ascribes to the master-pieces of ancient poetry. [P-l 

69, XLViii. Frustra. In vain. Mariana's song, in Measure 
for Measure, IV, i, 1. The tune probably used on the stage in 
Shakespeare's lifetime is in Elson (p. 167). 

70, XLix. Recover. Make well. 

L. In Imagine Pertransit Homo. Man passeth away like a 
shadow. Cf. Psalms CXLIV, 4. 

71, Proved. Approved. [P.] 
LI. Sonnet cxlviii. 
Censures. Judges. [P.] 

72, Watching. Staying awake. 

Lii. Exquisite in its equably-balanced metrical flow. [P,l 

73, Liii. Judging by its style, this beautiful example of old 
simplicity and feeling may, perhaps, be referred to the earlier 
years of Elizabeth. — Late forgot. Lately. [P.] 

Light. Fickle. 

75, Liv. Cassandra. The prophetess of Troy, who always 
foretold the truth, but was never believed. 

Lvi. Another of the songs of Amiens, in the Forest of Arden. 
As You Like It, III, ii, 174. 

76, LVii. Printed in a little anthology by Nicholas Breton, 
1597. It is, however, a stronger and finer piece of work than 
any known to be his. [P.] 

Silly. Simple. —Dole. Grief . — Chief . Chiefly. 

77, 1. 7. If there be . . . Obscure; perhaps, if there be any 
who speak harshly of thee, thy pain may plead for pity from 
Fate. — This poem, with lx and cxliii, are each graceful varia- 
tions of a long popular theme. [P.] 

78, Lviii. That busy archer. Cupid. — Descries. Used 
actively; — 'points out. — " The last line of this poem is a little 
obscured by transposition. He means, * Do they call ungrate- 
fulness there a virtue? '" (C. Lamb.) [P.] 

79, Lix. O Crudelis Amor. O cruel love. The phrase, 
without the '' O," is from Virgil's Tenth Eclogue, 1. 29. 

White lope. Suggested, Mr. Bullen notes, by a passage in 
Propertius (iii, 20) describing Spirits in the lower world: 

Vobiscum est lope, vobiscum Candida Tyro. [P.l 

81, Lxii. Sung by Feste to console the lovelorn Duke, Twelfth 
Night, II, iv, 52. 

Cypres or Cyprus, — used by the old writers for crape: whether 
from the French crespe or from the island whence it was im- 



500 NOTES 

ported. Its nocidonial similarity in spoiling to cypress has, here 
and in Milton's "IVnseroso," i)rol)al)ly confused readers. [P.] 

82, Lxiii. Ramage. C'onfiised noise. [P.] 

83, Lxiv. Fidele. The name assumed by lmo{2;en when, 
disjjjuised as a man, she finds her lost brothers, "^rhey, still 
supposinfi; her to be a boy, think her dead, and recite this dirge. 
Cijmbcline, IV, ii, 202. 

LXV. AnotluT of Ariel's maf2;i(i sonj^s, almost immediately 
followinji; the one on j). 34, describing to i<\'rdinand the sup- 
posed fate of his father. The Tcnipcsl, I, ii, 'A\)(\. Ivirly tune 
(1612) in Elson (p. 187). 

84, Lxvi. " I never saw anything like this funeral dirge," 
says ('harles Lamb, " except the ditty whi(^h reminds Ferdinand 
of his (lr()wn(Hl father in 7'//c Ton pest. As that is of the wat(M', 
watery; so this is of the earth, earthy. Both have that intense- 
n(\ss of feeling, which secMus to resolve itself into the element 
which it (M)nt.emplates." [P.] 

Lxvii. Sonnet xxxii. 

85, Lxviii. Sonnet lxxi. 

86, LXix. Sung by Portia's order, while Passanio muses 
before making his (choice of the (^askc^t which is to decide the 
outcome of tlieir lov(\ Merchant of Venice, 111, ii, 03. Some 
have supposed that through this song liassanio was warned 
against the fancy *' engendered in the eyes," and so prompted 
to select, the right, casket. 

Lxx. Paraj)hrased from an Italian madrigal. 

Ni)n so conoaoer poi 

Se voi le rose, o sian le rose iu voi. fP.j 

87, LXXI. Rosalind, thinking of the poor but admirable 
Rosader, sings this, to the accompaniment of her lute. Cf. 
p. 47, and note. 

88, Lxxii. Crystal. Fairness. [P.] 

89, Lxxiii. Stare. Starling. [P.l 

Lxxiv. This " Spousal Verse " was written in honor of the 
Ladies 101izab(>th and Katherine Somerset. Nowhere has Spen- 
ser more emphat.i(^ally displayed himself as the very poet of 
Beauty: The Renaissance impulse in I*]ngland is here seen at 
its highest and purest. The genius of Spenser, like Chaucer's, 
does itself justice only in poems of some h^ngth. Henc(^ it is 
impossible to represent it in this volume by other pieces of e(|ual 
merit, but of impracticable dimensions. And the same applies 
to such poems as the " Lover's Lament " or the " Ancient 
Mariner." [P.] 

90, 1. 13. Paramours. Lovers. 
1. 22. Entrailed. Twisted. [P.] 



NOTES 501 

1. 23. Flasket. A lonp;, shallow basket. 
1. 24. Feateously. Elegantly. [P.] 

91, 1. 28. Them seem'd. It seemed to them. 

92, 1. 0. Bred of summer's heat. A play on the word Somer- 
set, their family name. 

94, 1. 1. Shend. Shame. [P.] 

1. 12. Those bricky towers. The Temple. — I. 19. That 
great lord. Tlu; l']arl of Essex, Spenser's patron, then in disgrace. 

1. 2."). A noble peer. Iiob(;rt Devereux, second Lord Essex, 
then at the h(;ight of his brief triumph after taking Cadiz: hence 
the allusion following to the; Pillars of Hercules, placed near 
Gades by ancient legend. [P.] 

95, 1. 9. Elisa. Elizabeth. [P.] 

1. 16. Hesper. The evening star. 

1. 25. Twins of Jove. The stars Castor and Pollux. — I. 26. 
Baldric. Belt; tiie zodiac. [P.] 

97, Lxxvi. Sic Transit. Sic transit gloria mundi. So passes 
the glory of the world. 

98, Lxxviii. Sonnet cxlvi. — [Foil'd by.] These words are 
missing, in the original; various (nlitors have filled in the gap 
variously. Nielson (Cambridge, U.S.A., edition) reads (Tlirall 
to], bringing down two words the first printer misplaced in the 
line above. 

Lxxix. This lyric may with very high probability be assigned 
to Campion, in whose first Book of Airs it appeared (1601). 
The evidence sometimes quoted ascribing it to Lord Bacon 
appears to be valueless. [P.] 

loi, Lxxxii. Sonnet lxvi. — Unhappily. Evilly. — Simplic- 
ity. Folly. 

Summary of Book Second 

This division, embracing generally the latter eighty years of 
the seventeenth century, contains the close of our Early poetical 
style and the commencement of the Modern. In Dryden we 
see the first master of the new: in Milton, whose genius domi- 
nates here as Shakespeare's in the former book, — the crown and 
consummation of the early period. Their splendid Odes are 
tar in advance of any prior attempts, Spenser's excepted: they 
exhibit that wider and grander range which years and experience 
and the struggles of the time conferred on Poetry. Our Muses 
now give expression to political feeling, to religious thought, 
to a high philosophic statesmanship in writers su{;h as Marvell, 
Herbert, and Wotton: whilst in Marvell and Milton, again, 
we find noble attempts, hitherto rare in our literature, at pure 
description of nature, destined in our own age to be continued 
and equaled. Meanwhile the poetry of simple passion, although 



502 NOTES 

before 1660 often deformed by verbal fancies and conceits of 
thought, and afterwards by levity and an artificial tone, — pro- 
duced in Herrick and Waller some charming pieces of more 
finished art than the Elizahoihan: until in the courtly compli- 
ments of Sedley it seems to exhaust itself, and lie almost dor- 
mant for the hundred years between the days of Wither and 
SuckUng and the days of Burns and Cowper. — That the change 
from our early style to the modern brought with it at first a 
loss of nature and simphcity is undeniable: yet the bolder and 
wider scope which Poetry took between 1620 and 1700, and the 
successful efforts then made to gain greater clearness in expres- 
sion, in their results have been no slight compensation. [P.] 

103, Lxxxv, 1. 5. Holy sages. Prophets. — 1. 6. Our deadly 
forfeit should release. Should release us from the penalty of 
death. — 1. 10. Wont. Was accustomed. 

104, 1. 8. Wizards. Wise men. — 1. 9. Prevent. Be before. 

— 1. 12. Quire. An old spelling of choir. — 1. 13. From out 
His secret altar. Read Isaiah, VI, 1-8, for the story here 
referred to. 

105, 1. 8. Harbinger. One who goes before a king to arrange 
for accommodations. — 1. 9. Turtle. Turtledove. — 1. 19. 
Sovran. Milton preferred the Italian spelling of sovereign. 

1. 23. Whist. Hushed. [P.] 

1. 27. Birds of calm. See the classic myth of Halcyone. 

106, 1. 3. Influence. The ethereal fluid formerly supposed 
to be shed by the stars and to affect the characters and destiny 
of men. — 1. 6. Lucifer. The " light-bringer " ; the morning 
star. — 1. 8. Bespake. Ordered. — 1. 16. Burning axletree of 
the sun's chariot. 

1. 20. Than. Obsolete for then. —I 21. Pan. Used there 
for the Lord of all. [P.] 

107, 1. 2. Took. Captivated. — 1. 7. Cynthia. The moon- 
goddess. — 1. 12. Union. Pronounce in three syllables. — 1. 20. 
Unexpressive notes. Inexpressible (because of their beauty). 

— 1. 23. The Sons of Morning sung. Read Job, XXXVIII, 
4-11. 

108, 1. 1. Crystal spheres. The sun, moon, and stars w^ere 
once supposed to be set in spheres of crystal, which in revolving 
about the earth made a wonderful music, heard by the angels, 
though inaudible to men on earth. Cf. Merchant of Venice, V, 
i, 59-65. 

1. 8. Consort. Milton's spelling of this word, here and else- 
where, has been followed, as it is uncertain whether he used it 
in the sense of accompanying, or simply for concert. [P.] 

109, 1. 6. Horrid. Terrible. — 1. 7. Mount Sinai. See 
Exodus, XXII, 16-19. — 1. 13. The dreadful Judge. "And I 



NOTES 503 

saw a great white throne and him that sat on it, from whose 
face the earth and the heaven fled away." Revelation, XX, 11. 
— 1. 18. The old Dragon. '' And his tail drew the third part 
of the stars of heaven, and did cast them to the earth." Reve- 
lation, XII, 4. " The devil is come down unto you, having 
great wrath, because he knoweth that he hath but a short time." 
Ibid., V, 12. 

no, 1. 8. Genius. Spirit. 

1. 14. Lars and Lemures. Household gods and spirits of 
relations dead. — 1. 17. Flamens. Roman priests. [P.] 

1. 17. Quaint. Strange, unfamiliar. 

1. 22. That twice-batter'd god. Dagon. [P.] 

111, 1. 9. Osiris. The Egyptian god of agriculture (here, 
perhaps by confusion with Apis, figured as a bull), was torn 
to pieces by Typho and embalmed after death in a sacred chest. 
This myth, reproduced in Syria and Greece in the legends of 
Thammuz, Adonis, and perhaps Absyrtus, may have originally 
signified the annual death of the Sun or the Year under the 
influences of the winter darkness. Horus, the son of Osiris, as 
the New Year, in his turn overcomes Typho. — 1. 11. Unshow- 
er'd grass. As watered by the Nile only. [P.] 

1. 23. Our Babe, to show His Godhead. There is a sidelong 
allusion here to Hercules, who showed his godhead by stranghng 
two serpents while in his cradle. 

112, 1. 9. Youngest-teemed. Last born. [P.] 

1. 13. Bright-harness'd Angels. Angels in bright armor. 

Lxxxvi, 1. 21. Cold and hot and moist and dry. According 
to the science of former times, the four elemental properties of 
all matter. 

113, 1. 5. Jubal. Son of Lamech and inventor of musical 
instruments. Genesis, IV, 21. 

115, Lxxxvii. The Late Massacre. The Vaudois persecu- 
tion, carried on in 1655 by the Duke of Savoy. No more mighty 
sonnet than this " collect in verse," as it has been justly named, 
probably can be found in any language. Readers should observe 
that it is constructed on the original Italian or Provencal model. 
This form, in a language such as ours, not affluent in rhyme, 
presents great difficulties; the rhymes are apt to be forced, or 
the substance commonplace. But, when successfully handled, 
it has a unity and a beauty of effect which place the strict sonnet 
above the less compact and less lyrical systems adopted by 
Shakespeare, Sidney, Spenser, and other Elizabethan poets. [P.] 

Triple Tyrant. The Pope, the reference being to his triple 
crown. — Babylonian woe. The denunciations of Babylon in 
the book of Revelation were applied, by seventeenth-century 
Protestants, to the Church of Rome. 1 



504 NOTES 

Lxxxviii. Cromwell returned from Ireland in 1650, and Mar- 
veil probably wrote his lines soon after, whilst living at Nun- 
appleton in the Fairfax household. It is hence not surprising 
that (st. 21-24) he should have been deceived by Cromwell's 
professed submissiveness to the Parliament which, when it de- 
clined to register his decrees, he expelled by armed violence: — ■ 
one despotism, by natural law, replacing another. The poet's 
insight has, however, truly prophesied that result in his last 
two Unes. [P.] 

This ode, beyond doubt one of the finest in our language, and 
more in Milton's style than has been reached by any other 
poet, is occasionally obscure from imitation of the condensed 
Latin syntax. The meaning of st. 5 is " rivalry or hostility are 
the same to a lofty spirit, and limitation more hateful than 
opposition." The allusion in st. 11 is to the old physical doc- 
trines of the non-existence of a vacuum and the impenetrability 
of matter: — in st. 17 to the omen traditionally connected with 
the foundation of the capitol at Rome. [P.] 

ii8, 1. 10. Forced. Fated. [P.l 

119, 1. 22. The ancient belief that certain years in life com- 
plete natural periods and are hence peculiarly exposed to death, 
is introduced by the word climacteric. [P.] 

120, Lxxxix. Lycidas. The person here lamented is Milton's 
college contemporary, Edward King, drowned in 1637 whilst 
crossing from Chester to Ireland. [P.] 

Strict pastoral poetry was first written or perfected by the 
Dorian Greeks settled in Sicily: but the conventional use of it, 
exhibited more magnificently in " Lycidas " than in any other 
pastoral, is apparently of Roman origin. Milton, employing 
the noble freedom of a great artist, has here united ancient 
mythology with what may be called the modern mythology 
of Camus and Saint Peter, — to direct Christian images. Yet 
the poem, if it gains in historical interest, suffers in poetry by 
the harsh intrusion of the writer's narrow and violent theological 
politics. — The metrical structure of this glorious elegy is partly 
derived from Italian models. [P.] 

121, 1. 5. Sisters of the sacred well. The Muses, said to 
frequent the Pierian Spring at the foot of Mount Olympus. [P.] 

122, 1. 16. Mona. Anglesea, called by the Welsh poets the 
Dark Island, from its dense forests. — 1. 17. Deva. The Dee: 
a river which may have derived its magical character from 
Celtic traditions: it was long the boundary of Briton and Eng- 
lish. — These places are introduced, as being near the scene of 
the shipwreck. — 1. 21. Orpheus was torn to pieces by Thracian 
women. [P.] 

123, 1. 2. Amaryllis and Neaera. Names used here for the 



NOTES 505 

love-idols of poets: as Damocfas previously for a shepherd. — 
1. 9. The blind Fury. Atropos, fabled to cut the thread of life. 
— 1. 19. Arethuse and Mincius. Sicilian and Italian waters 
here alluded to as representing the pastoral poetry of Theocritus 
and Vergil. — 1. 22. Oat. Pipe, used here like Collins' oaten 
stop, 1. 1, No. CLxxxvi, for song. — 1. 30. Hippotades. Aeolus, 
god of the Winds. [P.] 

124, 1. 3. Panope. A Nereid. Certain names of local deities 
in the Hellenic mythology render some feature in the natural 
landscape, which the Greeks studied and analyzed with their 
usual unequaled insight and feeling. Panope seems to express 
the boundlessness of the ocean-horizon when seen from a height, 
as compared with the limited sky-line of the land in hilly coun- 
tries such as Greece or Asia Minor. — 1. 7. Camus. The Cam: 
put for King's University. — 1. 10. The sanguine flower. The 
hyacinth of the ancients: probably our iris. — 1. 13. The Pilot. 
Saint Peter, figuratively introduced as the head of the Church 
on earth, to foretell " the ruin of our corrupted clergy," as 
Milton regarded them, " then in their height " under Laud's 
primacy. — 1. 30. Scrannel. Screeching; apparently Milton's 
coinage (Masson), [P.] 

125, 1. 4. The wolf. The Puritans of the time were excited 
to alarm and persecution by a few conversions to Roman Cathol- 
icism which had recently occurred. — 1. 8. Alpheus. A stream 
in Southern Greece, supposed to flow underseas to join the 
Arethuse. — 1. 14. Swart star. The Dog Star, called swarthy 
because its heliacal rising in ancient times occurred soon after 
midsummer. — 1. 18. Rathe. Early. [P.] 

126, 1. 5. Moist vows. Either tearful prayers, or prayers for 
one at sea. — 1. 6. Bellerus. A giant, apparently created here 
by Milton to personify Belerium, the ancient title of the Land's 
End. — 1. 7. The great Vision. The story was that the Arch- 
angel Michael had appeared on the rock by Marazion in Mount's 
Bay which bears his name. Milton calls on him to turn his 
eyes from the south homeward, and to pity Lycidas, if his body 
has drifted into the troubled waters off the Land's End. Finis- 
terre being the land due south of Marazion, two places in that 
district (then through our trade with Corunna probably less 
unfamiliar to English ears), are named; — Namancos, now Mujio 
in Galicia, Bayona, north of the Minho, or perhaps a fortified 
rock (one of the Cies Islands) not unlike Saint Michael's Mount, 
at the entrance of Vigo Bay. — 1. IG. Ore. Rays of golden 
light. [P.] 

127, 1. 6. Doric lay. Sicihan, pastoral. [P.] 

129, xciii. The Assault was an attack on London expected in 
1642, when the troops of Charles I reached Brentford. " Writ- 



506 NOTES 

ten on his door " was in the original title of this sonnet. Milton 
was then living in Aldersgate Street. [P.] 

Colonel. Pronounce as spelled, in three syllables, — formerly 
the correct pronunciation in English, as it is still in French. 

130, The Emathian conqueror. When Thebes was destroyed 
(B.C. 335) and the citizens massacred by thousands, Alexander 
ordered the house of Pindar to be spared. — The repeated air 
of sad Electra's poet. Plutarch has a tale that when the Spartan 
confederacy in 404 B.C. took Athens, a proposal to demolish it 
was rejected through the effect produced on the commanders 
by hearing part of a chorus from the Electra of Euripides sung 
at a feast. There is however no apparent congruity between 
the lines quoted (167, 168 Ed. Dindorf) and the result ascribed 
to them. [P.] 

131, xcv. A fine example of a peculiar class of poetry; — that 
written by thoughtful men who practised this art but httle. 
Jeremy Taylor, Bishop Berkeley, Dr. Johnson, Lord Macaulay, 
have left similar specimens. [P.] 

132, xcvii. The Gifts of God. Herbert's own title was "The 
Pulley." 

133, xcviii. These beautiful verses should be compared with 
Wordsworth's great ode on immortality: and a copy of Vaughan's 
very rare little volume appears in the hst of Wordsworth's 
library. — In imaginative intensity, Vaughan stands beside his 
contemporary Marvell. [P.] 

134, xcix. Mr. Lawrence. A friend of Milton's whose father, 
Sir Henry Lawrence, had been active in making Cromwell 
Protector. 

135, Favonius. The spring wind. [P.] 

c. Cyriack Skinner. Formerly a pupil of Milton. — Themis. 
The goddess of Justice. Skinner was grandson by his mother 
to Sir E. Coke: — hence, as pointed out by Mr. Keightley, 
Milton's allusion to the bench. — 1. 8. Sweden was then at war 
with Poland, and France with the Spanish Netherlands. [P.] 

138, cm, 1. 15. Tire. Headdress, tiara. 

139, 1. 1. Sidneian showers. Either in allusion to the con- 
versations in the Arcadia, or to Sidney himself as a model of 
" gentleness " in spirit and demeanor. [P.] 

142, cv. Delicate humor, delightfully united to thought, at 
once simple and subtle. It is full of conceit and paradox, but 
these are imaginative, not as with most of our seventeenth- 
century poets, intellectual only. [P.] 

146, ex. Elizabeth of Bohemia. Daughter to James I, and 
ancestor of Sophia of Hanover. These lines are a fine specimen 
of gallant and courtly comphment. [P.] 

147, CXI. Lady M. Ley was daughter to Sir J. Ley, afterwards 



NOTES 507 

Earl of Marlborough, who died March, 1629, coincidently with 
the dissohition of the third Parhament of Charles' reign. Hence 
Milton poetically compares his death to that of the orator Isoc- 
rates of Athens, after Philip's victory in 328 b.c. [P.] 

148. All both judge you to relate them true. And to possess 
them. All believe that you truly tell your father's virtues, and 
that you possess them. 

150, cxvi. This is a remarkable example of the metaphrase, 
or setting over of a poem into another language without loss of 
poetic form. It was taken by Jonson from the Latin of Philos- 
tratus (Ep. 33). The enduring appeal both of the idea and of 
the lyric form Jonson gave to it three hundred years ago is 
shown by its popularity to-day as a college song, 

152. cxviii. A masterpiece of humor, grace, and gentle feeling, 
all, with Herrick's unfailing art, kept precisely within the pecuhar 
key which he chose, — or nature for him, — in his pastorals. — ■ 
The god unshorn. Imberbis Apollo. [P.] 

Fresh-quilted colors. The sunrise colors are the quilt of 
Aurora, the dawn, which she flings off before rising. — Matins. 
One of the canonical hours for prayer; properly, midnight; but 
here used for daybreak. '' Birds' matins " have long been a 
familiar fancy of the poets. 

153. Beads. Prayers. [P.] 

154. Many a green-gown has been given. Many a gown has 
been stained by a tumble on the grass. 

157, cxxiir. With better taste, and less diffuseness, Quarles 
might (one would think) have retained more of that high place 
which he held in popular estimate among his contemporaries. [P.] 

A counter to my coin. An imitation of, or substitute for, 
real money. 

160, cxxvii. From Prison. To which his active support of 
Charles I twice brought the high-spirited writer. — Gods. Thus 
in the original; Lovelace, in his fanciful way, making here a 
mythological allusion. Birds, commonly substituted, is without 
authority. — Committed. To prison. [P.] 

161, cxxviii. Blue-god. Neptune. [P.] 

.65, cxxxiii. Waly waly. An exclamation of sorrow, the 
root and the pronunciation of which are preserved in the word 
caterwaul. — Brae. Hillside. — Bum. Brook. [P.] 

167, 1. 5. Busk. Adorn. [P.] 

1. 9. Arthur-seat. Arthur's Seat; a craggy hill just outside of 
Edinburgh. 

1.11. Saint Anton's well. Below Arthur's Seat by Edinburgh. 
[P.] 

1. 13. Mati'mas. The feast of St. Martin is November 11. 

1. 24. Cramasie. Crimson. [P.] 



508 NOTES 

1 68, cxxxiv. This beautiful example of early simplicity is 
found in a songbook of 1620. These stanzas are JDy Richard 
Verstegan ( — c. 1635), a poet and antiquarian, pubhshed in his 
rare Odes (1601), under the title " Our Blessed Ladies Lullaby," 
and reprinted by Mr. Orby Shipley in his beautiful Carmina 
Mariana (1893). The four stanzas here given form the opening 
of a hymn of twenty-four. [P.] 

169, cxxxv. The traditional tune of this ballad is given in 
Dick's Sonqs of Burns (p. 337). 

Burd. Maiden. [P.] 

170, cxxxvi. Corbies, Crows. [P.] 

171, Fail. Turf. — Hause. Neck. — Theek. Thatch. — 
If not in their origin, in their present form this, with the preced- 
ing poem and cxxxiii, appear due to the seventeenth century, 
and have therefore been placed in Book II. [P.] 

cxxxvii. The poetical and the prosaic, after Cowley's fashion 
blend curiously in this deeply felt elegy. [P.] 

172, 1. 22. Inform. Take the form of; occupy. 

175, cxxxix. Brave. Handsome. 

176, cxLi. Perhaps no poem in this collection is more deli- 
cately fancied, more exquisitely finished. By placing his descrip- 
tion of the fawn in a young girl's mouth, Marvell has, as it were, 
legitimated that abundance of " imaginative hyperbole " to 
which he is always partial: he makes us feel it natural that a 
maiden's favorite should be whiter than milk, sweeter than sugar 
— '' lilies without, roses within." The poet's imagination is 
justified in its seeming extravagance by the intensity and unity 
with which it invests his picture. [P.] 

178, cxLii. The remark quoted in the note to No. lxv applies 
equally to these truly wonderful verses. Marvell here throws 
himself into the very soul of the Garden with the imaginative 
intensity of Shelley in his '' West Wind." — This poem appears 
also as a translation in Marvell's works. The most striking 
verses in it, here quoted as the book is rare, answer more or 
less to stanzas 2 and 6: — 

Alma Quies, teneo te! et te, germana Quietis, 
Simplicitas! vos ergo diu per templa, per urbes 
Quaesivi, regum perque alta palatia, frustra: 
Sed vos hortorum per opaca silentia, longe 
Celarunt plantae virides, et concolor umbra. 

[P.] 

The meaning of stanza 1 is, in brief, that man can win by a 
lifetime of toil only meager honors, a mere sprig of palm or 
bay; if he seeks not glory, but repose, the trees and flowers are 
all his. — 1. 24. To. Compared to. 

181, cxLiii. Fortunati Nimium. Fortunate overmuch; a 



NOTES 509 

phrase from Virgil, Georgics, II, 458. — 1. 9. Nappy. Strong, 
heady. — 1. 12. Crabs. Crab apples. 
1. 19. Tutties. Nosegays. [P.] 

182, 1. 6. Silly. Simple. 

cxLiv. L' Allegro and II Penseroso. It is a striking proof of 
Milton's astonishing power, that these, the earliest great lyrics 
of the landscape in our language, should still remain supreme in 
their style for range, variety, and melodious beauty. The 
bright and the thoughtful aspects of nature and of Ufe are their 
subjects: but each is preceded by a mythological introduction 
in a mixed classical and Italian manner. — With that of L' Al- 
legro may be compared a similar myth in the first section of the 
first book of S. Marmion's graceful Cupid and Psyche, 1637. 

183, 1. 18. The mountain-nymph. Compare Wordsworth's 
sonnet, ccliv. — - 1. 20 is in apposition to the preceding, by a 
syntactical license not uncommon with Milton. 

184, 1. 31. Cynosure. The Pole Star. [P.] 

185, 1. 3. Cory don, Thyrsis, etc. Shepherd names from the 
old idylls. 

1. 14. Rebeck. An elementary form of violin. [P.] 

186, 1. 21. Jonson's learned sock. His comedies are deeply 
colored by classical study. 

1. 25. Lydian airs. Used here to express a Hght and festive 
style of ancient music. The " Lydian mode," one of the seven 
original Greek scales, is nearly identical with our ** major." [P.] 

187, cxLV, 1. 13. Bestead. Avail. [P.] 

188, 1. 4. Starr'd Ethiop queen. Cassiopeia, the legendary 
Queen of Ethiopia, and thence translated amongst the constel- 
lations. [P.] 

189, 1. 13. Cynthia. The Moon. Milton seems here to have 
transferred to her chariot the dragons anciently assigned to 
Demeter and to Medea. [P.] 

190, 1. 11. Hermes. Called Trismegistus, a mystical writer 
of the Neo-Platonist school. — 1. 22. Thebes, etc. Subjects of 
Athenian tragedy. — 1. 25. Buskin'd. Tragic, in opposition to 
soJz above. 

1. 27. Musaeus. A poet in mythology. [P.] 

191, 1. 1. Him that left half -told. Chaucer in his incomplete 
"Squire's Tale." — 1. 8. Great bards. Ariosto, Tasso, and Spen- 
ser are here presumably intended. — 1. 15. Frounced. Curled. 

1. 16. The Attic Boy. Cephalus. [P.] 

193, cxLVi. Emigrants supposed to be driven towards America 
by the government of Charles I. [P.] 

1. 18. Prelate's. Bishop's, alluding to the persecution of the 
Puritans by the Church of England. — 1. 26. Ormus. An 
island in the Persian Gulf, a famous market for jewels, 



510 NOTES 

194, 1. 3. But apples, etc. A fine example of Marvell's imag- 
inative hyperbole. [P.] 

1. 8. Ambergris. A waxy substance found floating in trop- 
ical seas, used for perfume. — 1. 9. Rather. More. 
cxLvii, 1. 25. Phantasy. Imagination. 
1. 26. Concent. Harmony. [P.] 

195, 1. I. The sapphire-colored throne. See Revelation, IV, 4. 
cxLViii. Nox Nocti Indicat Scientiam. Night unto night 

showeth knowledge. Psalms XIX, 2. 

197, cxLix. A lyric of a strange, fanciful, yet solemn beauty: 
— Cowley's style intensified by the mysticism of Henry More. 

[P.] 

198, 1. 1. Monument. The world. [P.] 

199, CLi. Entitled " A Song in Honour of St. CeciUa's Day: 
1697." [P.] 

1. 21. Jove, Who left his blissful seats. Timotheus in his 
first song describes Alexander as the son of Jove. 
201, 1. 9. Darius. The leader of the Persian army. 
203, 1. 21. Vocal frame. The organ. 

Summary of Book Third 

It is more difficult to characterize the English Poetry of the 
eighteenth century than that of any other. For it was an age 
not only of spontaneous transition, but of bold experiment: 
it includes not only such absolute contrasts as distinguish the 
" Rape of the Lock " from the " Parish Register," but such 
vast contemporaneous differences as lie between Pope and Col- 
lins, Burns and Cowper. Yet we may clearly trace three leading 
moods or tendencies: — the aspects of courtly or educated life 
represented by Pope and carried to exhaustion by his followers; 
the poetry of Nature and of Man, viewed through a cultivated, 
and at the same time an impassioned frame of mind by Collins 
and Gray : — lastly, the study of vivid and simple narrative, 
including natural description, begun by Gay and Thomson, 
pursued by Burns and others in the north, and established in 
England by Goldsmith, Percy, Crabbe, and Cowper. Great 
varieties in style accompanied these diversities in aim: poets 
could not always distinguish the manner suitable for subjects 
so far apart: and the union of conventional and of common 
language, exhibited most conspicuously by Burns, has given a 
tone to the poetry of that century which is better explained by 
reference to its historical origin than by naming it artificial. 
There is, again, a nobleness of thought, a courageous aim at 
high, and in a strict sense manly, excellence in many of the 
writers: — nor can that period be justly termed tame and wanting 



NOTES 511 

in originality, which produced poems such as Pope's Satires, 
Gray's Odes and Elegy, the ballads of Gay and Carey, the songs 
of Burns and Cowper. In truth Poetry at this, as at all times, 
was a more or less unconscious mirror of the genius of the age: 
and the many complex causes which made the eighteenth cen- 
tury the turning-time in modern European civilization are also 
more or less reflected in its verse. An intelligent reader will 
find the influence of Newton as markedly in the poems of Pope, 
as of EUzabeth in the plays of Shakespeare. On this great 
subject, however, these indications must here be sufficient. [P.] 

207, CLiii. We have no poet more marked by rapture, by the 
ecstasy which Plato held the note of genuine inspiration, than 
Collins. Yet but twice or thrice do his lyrics reach that sim- 
plicity, that sinceram sermonis Attici gratiam to which this ode 
testifies his enthusiastic devotion. His style, as his friend Dr. 
Johnson truly remarks, was obscure; his diction often harsh 
and unskilfully labored; he struggles nobly against the narrow, 
artificial manner of his age, but his too scanty years did not 
allow him to reach perfect mastery. — 1. 18. Hybla. Near 
Syracuse. — 1. 20. Her whose . . . woe. The nightingale, 
" for which Sophocles seems to have entertained a pecuhar fond- 
ness "; Collins here refers to the famous chorus in the Oedipus 
at Colonus. — 1. 23. Cephisus. The stream encircHng Athens 
on the north and west, passing Colonus. [P.] 

208, 1. 14. Stay'd to sing. Stayed her song when imperial 
tyranny was established at Rome. — St. 7 refers to the Italian 
amorist poetry of the Renaissance: In Collins' day, Dante was 
almost unknown in England. — 1. 28. Meeting soul. A soul 
which moves sympathetically towards simplicity as she comes 
to inspire the poet. [P.] 

209, 1. 1. Of these. Taste and genius. [P.] 

213, CLViii. Rule Britannia, which has become one of the 
most popular of British patriotic songs, was written as part of 
the Masque of Alfred (words by J. Thomson and David Mallet, 
music by Dr. Arne), performed in commemoration of the acces- 
sion of George I, and in honor of the birthday of the Princess 
of Brunswick, August 1, 1740. 

215, CLix. The Bard. In 1757, when this splendid ode was 
completed, so very little had been printed, whether in Wales 
or in England, in regard to Welsh poetry, that it is hard to dis- 
cover whence Gray drew his Cymric allusions. The fabled 
massacre of the Bards (shown to be wholly groundless in Stephens' 
Literature of the Kymry) appears first in the family history of 
Sir John Wynn of Gwydir (cir. 1600), not published till 1773; 
but the story seems to have passed in MS. to Carte's History, 
whence it may have been taken by Gray. The references to 



512 NOTES 

high-horn Hod and soft hlcwvUijn, to CadwnUo and Uricn, may, 
similarly, have been dciiviMl from tlie " Sjx'cimcns " of early 
Welsh poetry, by the liev. I*]. l*A'ans: — as, althoiif^ii not |)ub- 
lished till 17(v4, the MS., we learn from a letter to Dr. Wharton, 
was in (Jray's hands by July, 17()(), and may have reaehed him 
by 1757. It is, however, doubtful whether (iray (of whose! 
aequaintniiee with Welsh we have no evidence) nuist not have 
l)een also aided by some Welsh scholar. He is one of the poets 
least likely to scatter epithets at random: "soft" or ^('utle is 
the epithet emphatically and specially given to IJewelyn in 
cont(>mporary Welsh jioetry, and is hence here used with par- 
ticular propriety. Yet, witlu)ut such assistance as we havt; 
sug{i;est(ul, (Jray could hardly have selected \\w epithet, although 
applied to the king (p. 141-;^) among a crowd of others, in 
LlijOdd (hrrs ()(h\ printed by Evans. — After lamenting his 
comrades (st. 2, 3) the Hard jirophesies the fate of Edward II, 
and the conquests of Edward 111 (4): his death and that of the 
Black Prince (5): of Richard II, with the wars of York and 
Lancaster, the murder of Henry VI {the meek usurper), and of 
Edward V and his brotluM- (()). He turns to the glory and pros- 
perity following the accession of the Tudors (7), through Eliza- 
l)eth's r(>ign (S): and concludes with a vision of the poetry of 
Shakespeare and Milton. \V.\ 

1. S. Cambria. Wales. — 1. 11. Snowdon. Th(> (^hief moun- 
tain of Wales. 

1. 13. Glo'ster. (lilbert de ('hire, son-in-law to h^dward. — 
Mortimer, one of the Lords Marchers of Wales. [P.| 

2i6, 1. 4. High-born Heel, soft Llewellyn. The Dissertatio 
de Hardis of lOvans names the first as son to tlu; king Owain 
(Iwynedd: Llewelyn, last, king of North Wales, was murdered 
1282. — 1. f). Cadwallo. ('adwallon (died iWW) and Urieii 
Rheged (early kings of (iwynt'dd and ('umbria respectiv(4y) 
are mentioned by Evans (p. 7.S) as bards none of whose poetry 
is extant. — 1. 9. Modred. I*iVans supplies no data for this 
name which (Iray (it has been supposed) uses for Merlin (Myrd- 
din Wyllt), held" prophet as well as poet. — The italicized lines 
mark where the bard's song is joined by that of his predecessors 
departed. — 1. 11. Arvon. TIk^ shores of (Carnarvonshire op- 
posite Anglesey. Whether intentionally or through ignorance 
of the real dat.es, (Jray her(> secMns to represent, the bard as speak- 
ing of t.h(>se poets, all of (earlier days, Llew(4yn excejjted, as his 
own contemporari(>s at the close of the thirteenth century. [P.] 

Gray, whose penetrating and powerful genius rendered him 
in many ways an initiator in advance of his age, is probably 
the first of our poets who made some ac(iuaintance with the 
rich and admirable poetry in which Wales from the sixth ccn- 



NOTES r>i:>> 

tury h;iH boon ff;rii!o, — hfforc urxj hwxom \\\h tirno Ro l^arharouHly 
ii<;{4l('cUi(i, not in lOu^IitrKj only. Jl(;ri(;(; it hjiH }><;cti Uion^lit 
woiUi wliilc lion; to cwU-r into u litth; (Jcl.-iil upon liiH (Jynirio 
a-lliiKioriH. |I*.) 

217, I. 4. She-wolf, i.s.'ilxl of J"'ran(;(;, udiilU-rouH Qnocn of 
JMivvunl II. \\'.\ 

218, I. 5. Towers of Julius. TIk; 'JVjwcr of I^ondon, hnllt in 
part, uftftoniinj^ to tradition, by Julius (Ja'Hur. — 1. 11. Bristled 
boar. Tlic bad^f; of Itirliard III. — 1. 17. Half of thy heart. 
(^ur-'-n JOUianor di(;fl .soon aj'tcr tlu; con(jii(;st of Wales. ~ 1. 27. 
Arthur. Henry VII named liis eldest son thus, in difference to 
nativ(; U'i'Xu\\L, and story. [P.] 

220, e'LX. 1746. The dat<; of the battle of Culloden, in 
wliieh the duk<; of Currjberland defe-ated the Scot^eh arrny undrtr 
J>ord (\i'.()r\i:(- .Murray and fhe Voun}4 Prct(;nder, " bonnie Prince 
(Jfiarli(;." This [>oetn ii.nd thr; followirif^ {^ive the I^nj^lish and 
the Scotch vi(;w of the battle;. 

220, CLXi, The Highlanders called th<; ba,ttle of (Julloden, 
Druinossi(;. |P.| 

221, I. 7. Thou cruel lord. Cuinb(;rland. 

(M.xii. Flodden. UelVat of .lames IV of Scotland by the 
Isnj^lish, l.')!;). See Scott's A/'^//7///'o/t. 

Lilting. Sin^iri}.', blithely. — Loaning. P>road lane. - Bughts. 
Pens. Scorning, liallyint!;. — Dowie. Unary. - Baffin' and 
gabbin'. .lokin^r :ind fhattint.';. - Leglin. Milkpail. Shearing. 
Pcaf/uifji;. Bandsters. Sheaf-binders. — Lyart. ^biz/Jed. — 
Runkled. Wrinkled. Fleeching. Coaxing. [P.] 

222, Gloaming, 'i'wilight. — Bogle, (^host. — Dool. Sorrow. 
HM 

CLXI 1 1. Braes. Steep river banks. 

224. c'Lxiv. The editor has found no authoritative text of 
this i)0<;m, to his mind sui)erior to any other of its class in m»?lody 
and pathfis. Part is f>robably not later tfian th(; seven teentli 
(-;ntury. in other stanzas a more modern hand, much resembling 
Scott's, is traceable. Logan's po(,'m (e'LXiiij exhibits a knowl- 
f;dg(i rather of the old h.'gend than oi the old verses. — Hecht. 
Promis(;d; tlie obsolete hujhl. [P.| 

225. Mavis. Thrusli. — Ilka. Kvery. — Lav'rock. Lark. — • 
Haughs. Valley-meadows. — Twined. l'a,rted from. Marrow. 
Mate. [P.] 

226. Syne. Then. [P.] 

cnxv. The Royal (ieorge, of one hundred and eight guns, 
whilst undergoing a partial careening at Spith(.'a(i, was overset 
af)Out 10 a.m. August 20, 17H2. Th(; total loss was believe*] to 
be nearly one thousand soiils. — This litth; p<jem might b(; 
called one of our trial-pieces, in regard to tast*;. The' read(,'r 



514 NOTES 

who feels the vigor of description and the force of pathos under- 
lying Cowper's bare and truly Greek simplicity of phrase, may 
assure himself se valde projecisse in poetry. [P.] 

229, cLXVii. A little masterpiece in a very difficult style: 
Catullus himself could hardly have bettered it. In grace, ten- 
derness, simplicity, and humor, it is worthy of the ancients: 
and even more so, from the completeness and unity of the picture 
presented. [P.j 

Carey's own account of the origin of this song is as follows: 
" A shoemaker's apprentice making a holiday with his sweet- 
heart treated her with a sight of Bedlam, the puppet-shows, 
the flying chairs, and all the elegancies of Moorfields, whence 
proceeding to the Farthing Pie House he gave her a collation 
of buns, cheese-cakes, gammon of bacon, stuffed beer, and 
bottled ale, through all of which scenes the author followed her. 
Charmed with the simplicity of their courtship he drew from 
what he had witnessed this little sketch of nature." The poem 
was incorporated by Gay into his Beggars^ Opera: the present 
music, however, goes back to an earher date, about 1620. See 
Fitzgerald, Stories of Famous Songs. 

231, 1. 17. Seven long years. Of his apprenticeship. 
CLXViii. Music in Dick, Songs of Burns (p. 134). 

232, CLXix. Trow. Trust. 

233, Skaith. Injury. 

235, CLXXii. Perhaps no writer who has given such strong 
proofs of the poetic nature has left less satisfactory poetry than 
Thomson. Yet this song, with " Rule Britannia " and a few 
others, must make us regret that he did not more seriously 
apply himself to lyrical writing. [P.] 

236, CLXXiv. With what insight and tenderness, yet in how 
few words, has this painter-poet here himself told love's secret! 

[PI 

237, cLXXVi. Burns also printed this in a form with the even 

lines lengthened by one foot, to fit the tune of the " Caledonian 
Hunt's Delight," which is printed in Dick's Songs of Burns (p. 
112). The first stanza is: 

Ye banks and braes o' bonnie Doon 

How can ye blume sae fresh and fair! 
How can ye chant, ye little birds, 

And I sae weary, fu' o' care! 

238, CLXXVii. 1. 7. Aeolian lyre. The Greeks ascribed the 
origin of their lyrical poetry to the colonies of Aeolis in Asia 
Minor. — 1. 23. Thracia's hills. Supposed a favorite resort of 
Mars. [P.l 

239, 1. 4. Feather'd king. The eagle of Jupiter, admirably 
described by Pindar in a passage here imitated by Gray. — 



NOTES 515 

1. 10. Idalia. In Cyprus, where Cytherea (Venus) was espe- 
cially worshiped. [P.J 

240, 1. 7. Hyperion. The sun. — St. 6-8 allude to the poets 
of the islands and mainland of Greece, to those of Rome and 
of England. [P.] 

241, 1. 10. Nature's Darling. Shakespeare. — 1. 21. He, that 
rode sublime. Milton. — 1. 23. Secrets of the abyss. In Para- 
dise Lost, Books 1 and II. — 1. 25. Living Throne. See the 
poem cxLVii, as well as Paradise Lost. — 1, 28. Closed his eyes. 
Compare Milton's sonnet, xciv. 

242, 1. 13. Theban eagle. Pindar. [P.J 

245, CLXxviir, 1. 19. Chaste-eyed Queen. Diana. [P.J 
247, CLXXix. From that wild rhapsody of mingled grandeur, 
tenderness, and obscurity, that " medley between inspiration 
and possession," which poor Smart is believed to have written 
whilst in confinement for madness. [P.J 

249, CLXXxi. The dreadful light. Of life and experience. [P.J 
CLXXXii. Attic warbler. The nightingale. [P.J 

252, CLXxxiv. Sleekit. Sleek. — Bickering brattle. Flitter- 
ing flight. — Laith. Loth. — Pattle. Ploughstaff. — Whiles. 
At times. — A daimen-icker. A corn-ear now and then. — 
Thrave. Shock. — Lave. Rest. [P.J 

253. Foggage. After-grass. — Snell. Biting. — But . . . hald. 
Without dwelling place. — Thole. Bear. — Cranreuch. Hoar- 
frost. — Thy lane. Alone. — A-gley. Off the right line, awry. 

[P.J 

255, CLXxxvi, 1. 8. Brede. Embroidery, interwoven design. 
— 1. 22. Folding-star. Evening star, which appears at the 
time for bringing in the sheep. 

258, CLXxxvii, 1. 10. Glebe. Clod, soil. — 1. 17. The boast 
of heraldry, etc. This stanza is said to have been quoted just 
before the battle of the Plains of Abraham, by General Wolfe, 
who declared he would rather have written that, than take 
Quebec. 

259, 1. 15. Hampden. One of the leaders against the tyranny 
of Charles I. 

262, cLxxxviii. Trysted hour. Hour appointed for meeting. 
Stoure. Dust storm. — Braw. Smart. [P. J 

263, CLXXXix. Composed in honor of Miss Leslie Bailhe, 
who, with her father and sister, had stopped on a journey to 
England to call on Burns. He rode with them some fifteen 
miles, and on the way back composed this song, to the tune of 
" The Collier's Bonnie Lassie." Dick (p. 44). 

264, Scaith. Hurt. — Tent. Guard. — Steer. Molest. [P.J 
cxc. The tune, " Major Graham," which Burns learned in hia 

youth, is in Dick (p. 404). 



516 NOTES 

265, cxci. Drumlie. Muddy. — Birk. Birch. [P.] 

267, cxcir, 1. 21. Greet. Cry. — 1. 26. Daurna. Dare not. 
— There can hardly exist a poem more truly tragic in the highest 
sense than this : nor, perhaps, Sappho excepted, has any poetess 
equaled it. [P.] 

268, cxciii. Burns wrote these words to the old tune, " Weary 
fa' you, Duncan Gray" (Dick, p. 412), which he said was "that 
kind of light-horse gallop of an old air which precludes senti- 
ment. The ludicrous is the leading feature." 

Fou. Merry with drink. — Coost. Carried. — Unco skeigh. 
Very proud. — Gart. Forced. — Abeigh. Aside. — Ailsa Craig. 
A rock in the Firth of Clyde. — Grat his een . . . bleer't. Cried 
till his eyes were bleared. — Lowpin. Leaping. — Linn. Water- 
fall. —Sair. Sore. [P.] 

269, Smoor'd. Smothered. — Grouse and canty. Blithe and 
gay. [P.J 

cxciv. Burns justly named this " one of the most beautiful 
songs in the Scots or any other language." One stanza, inter- 
polated by Beattie, is here omitted : — it contains two good 
lines, but is out of harmony with the original poem. — Bigonet. 
Little cap: probably altered from heguinette. [P.] 

270, Slaes. Sloes. The shiny black fruit of the blackthorn 
shrub. 

Thraw. Twist. [P.] 
Braw. Fine. 
Caller. Fresh. [P.] 

271, cxcv. Burns himself, despite two attempts, failed to 
improve this little absolute masterpiece of music, tenderness, 
and simplicity: this " romance of a Hfe " in eight lines. — Eerie. 
Strictly, scared: uneasy. [P.] 

272, cxcvi. One of Burns's " honeymoon series," in honor of 
Jean Armour, whom he married (1788). 

Airts. Quarters. — Row. Roll. — Shaw. Small wood in a 
hollow, spinney. [P.] 

273, Knowes. Knolls. The last two stanzas are not by 
Burns. [P.] 

cxcvii. Jo. Sweetheart. — Brent. Smooth. — Pow. Head. 

274, cxcviii. Leal. Faithful. — Fain. Happy. [P.] 

275, cxcix. Eton College. Not a college in the American 
sense, but a famous preparatory school. 

Henry VI founded Eton. [P.] 

278, cc. Written in 1773, towards the beginning of Cowper's 
second attack of melancholy madness — a time when he alto- 
gether gave up prayer, saying, " For him to implore mercy 
would only anger God the more." Yet had he given it up 
when sane, it would have been maior insania. [P.] 



NOTES 517 

281, cci, 1. 4. Vengeful band. The Furies, who pursued 
those who had offended the gods. 

ecu. Alexander Selkirk. The original of Robinson Crusoe. 

283, cciii. The editor would venture to class in the very 
first rank this sonnet, which, with cciv, records Cowper's grati- 
tude to the lady whose affectionate care for many years gave 
what sweetness he could enjoy to a life radically wretched. 
Petrarch's sonnets have a more ethereal grace and a more per- 
fect finish; Shakespeare's more passion; Milton's stand supreme 
in stateliness; Wordsworth's in depth and delicacy. But Cow- 
per's unite with an cxquisiteness in the turn of thought which 
the ancients would have called irony, an intensity of pathetic 
tenderness peculiar to his loving and ingenuous nature. — There 
is much mannerism, much that is unimportant or of now ex- 
hausted interest in his poems: but where he is great, it is with that 
elementary greatness which rests on the most universal human 
feelings. Cowper is our highest master in simple pathos. [P.J 

284, CCIV. Since first our sky was overcast. Referring to his 
own recurring attacks of insanity. 

286, ccv. Cowper's last original poem, founded upon a story 
told in Anson's Voyages. It was written March, 1799; he died 
in next year's April. [P.] 

288. ccvi. Very little except his name appears recoverable 
with regard to the author of this truly noble poem, which ap- 
peared in the Scripscrapologia, or Collins' Doggerel Dish of 
All Sorts, with three or four other pieces of merit, Birmingham, 
1804. [P.] 

289. Nabob. The title of a governor of a town or province 
in India; hence applied to anyone who came back from India 
with a large fortune made by ruhng the natives. 

290. Everlasting. Used with side-allusion to a cloth so 
named, at the time when Collins wrote. [P.j 

Summary of Book Fourth 

It proves sufficiently the lavish wealth of our own age in 
Poetry, that the pieces which, without conscious departure from 
the Standard of Excellence, render this Book by far the longest, 
were with very few exceptions composed during the first thirty 
years of the nineteenth century. Exhaustive reasons can hardly 
be given for the strangely sudden appearance of individual 
genius: that, however, which assigns the splendid national 
achievements of our recent poetry to an impulse from the France 
of the first Republic and Empire is inadequate. The first 
French Revolution was rather one result, — the most conspicu- 
ous, indeed, yet itself in great measure essentially retrogressive, 



518 NOTES 

— of that wider and more potent spirit which through inquiry 
and attempt, through strength and weakness, sweeps mankind 
round the circles (not, as some too confidently argue, of Advance, 
but) of gradual Transformation: and it is to this that we must 
trace the literature of Modern Europe. But, without attempt- 
ing discussion on the motive causes of Scott, Wordsworth, 
Shelley, and others, we may observe that these poets carried 
to further perfection the later tendencies of the century pre- 
ceding, in simplicity of narrative, reverence for human passion 
and character in every sphere, and love of Nature for herself: 

— that, whilst maintaining on the whole the advances in art 
made since the Restoration, they renewed the half-forgotten 
melody and depth of tone which marked the best Elizabethan 
writers: — that, lastly, to what was thus inherited they added 
a richness in language and a variety in meter, a force and fire 
in narrative, a tenderness and bloom in feeling, an insight into 
the finer passages of the Soul and the inner meanings of the 
landscape, a larger sense of Humanity, — hitherto scarcely 
attained, and perhaps unattainable even by predecessors of not 
inferior individual genius. In a word, the Nation which, after 
the Greeks in their glory, may fairly claim that during six cen- 
turies it has proved itself the most richly gifted of all nations 
for Poetry, expressed in these men the highest strength and 
prodigality of its nature. They interpreted the age to itself — 
hence the many phases of thought and style they present: — 
to sympathize with each, fervently and impartially, without fear 
and without fancifulness, is no doubtful step in the higher educa- 
tion of the soul. For purity in taste is absolutely proportionate 
to strength — and when once the mind has raised itself to grasp 
and to delight in excellence, those who love most will be found 
to love most wisely. 

But the gallery which this Book offers to the reader will aid 
him more than any preface. It is a royal Palace of Poetry 
which he is invited to enter: 

Adparet domus intus, et atria longa patescunt — 

though it is, indeed, to the sympathetic eye only that its treas- 
ures will be visible. [P.] 

291, ccviii. This beautiful lyric, printed in 1783, seems to 
anticipate in its imaginative music that return to our great 
early age of song, which in Blake's own lifetime was to prove, 

— how gloriously! that the English muses had resumed their 
" ancient melody ": — Keats, Shelley, Byron, — he overlived 
them all. [P.] 

292, ccix, 1. 8. Parle. Speech. 

293, ccx. Chapman's Homer. Chapman was a poet and 



NOTES 519 

dramatist of the time of Shakespeare. His translation of Homer, 
while very splendid in poetic form and imagery, is less in the 
spirit of the original than of Elizabethan verse. 

294. Stout Cortez. History would here suggest Balboa: 
(A.T.). It may be noticed, that to find in Chapman's Homer 
the " pure serene " of the original, the reader must bring with 
him the imagination of the youthful poet; — he must be " a 
Greek himself," as Shelley finely said of Keats. [P.] 

298, ccxii. The most tender and true of Byron's smaller 
poems. [P.] 

299, ccxiii. This poem exemplifies the peculiar skill with 
which Scott employs proper names: — a rarely misleading sign 
of true poetical genius. [P.l 

302, ccxv. In some editions called " Lines to an Indian Air." 
^ 312, ccxxvi. Simple as " Lucy Gray " seems, a mere narra- 
tive of what " has been, and may be again," yet every touch 
in the child's picture is marked by the deepest and purest ideal 
character. Hence, pathetic as the situation is, this is not strictly 
a pathetic poem, such as Wordsworth gives us in ccxxi, Lamb 
in ccLXiv, and Scott in his " Maid of Neidpath," — " almost 
more pathetic," as Tennyson once remarked, " than a man has 
the right to be." And Lyte's lovely stanzas (ccxxiv) suggest, 
perhaps, the same remark. [P.l 

313 Moor. A tract of uninclosed, waste ground, overgrown 
with heather. — Minster-clock. Church clock. — Faggot-band. 
String or strip of bark used for tying up twigs into bundles. 

314. Furlong. Eighth of a mile. 

319, ccxxxi, 1. 3. Pensile. Hanging in space. 

324, ccxxxv. In this and in other instances the addition (or 
the change) of a title has been risked, in hope that the aim of 
the piece following may be grasped more clearly and imme- 
diately. [P.l 

326, ccxxxvii. La Belle Dame Sans Merci. The lovely 
lady without mercy. Keats has taken an ancient tradition 
of enchantment and made it live again for modern ears, 

327. Zone. Belt. 

332, ccxLir. This beautiful sonnet was the last word of a 
youth, in whom, if the fulfilment may ever safely be prophesied 
from the promise, England lost one of the most rarely gifted in 
the long roll of her poets. Shakespeare and Milton, had their 
lives been closed at twenty-five, would (so far as we know) 
have left poems of less excellence and hope than the youth 
who, from the petty school and the London surgery, passed at 
once to a place with them of " high collateral glory." [P.J 

Eremite. Hermit. 

333, ccxLiii. Charact'ry. Letters. » 



520 NOTES 

334, ccxLiv. Desideria. Lost and longed for. 

ccxLV. It is impossible not to regret that Moore has written 
so little in this sweet and genuinely national style. [P.] 

335, ccxLvi. A masterly example of Byron's command of 
strong thought and close reasoning in verse:- — ^ as the next is 
equally characteristic of Shelley's wayward intensity. [P.] 

338, ccxLvii. Written to Jane Williams, for whom the poet 
had in his later years a romantic attachment. 

ccxLvui. From The Lady of the Lake. — Pibroch. A kind 
of bagpipe music, variations on a particular kind of theme, 
generally martial. — Donuil Dhu. Donald the Black. 

347, ccLiii. Bonnivard, a Genevese, was imprisoned by the 
Duke of Savoy in Chillon on the lake of Geneva for his coura- 
geous defense of his country against the tyranny with which 
Piedmont threatened it during the first half of the seventeenth 
century. — This noble sonnet is worthy to stand near Milton's 
on the Vaudois massacre. [P.] 

348, ccLiv. Switzerland was usurped by the French under 
Napoleon in 1800: Venice in 1797 (cclv). [P.] 

349, CCLV. Espouse the everlasting Sea. Referring to the 
annual ceremony, in ancient times, when the Doge flung a ring 
into the sea, to symbolize the wedding of the city to the ocean. 

ccLVi. 1802. The year of the Peace of Amiens, by which 
England made peace with Napoleon, surrendering all her recent 
conquests. Wordsworth felt that England was disgraced by a 
humiliating peace, endured only because of a fear of high taxes. 

351, ccLix. This battle was fought, December 2, 1800, be- 
tween the Austrians under Archduke John and the French 
under Moreau, in a forest near Munich. Hohen Linden means 
High Lim drees. [P.J 

352, Furious Frank and fiery Hun. The French and the 
Austro-Hungarians. 

353, ccLX. Blenheim. Victory of the Allies, 1704, under 
Prince Eugene of Savoy and the English Duke of Marlborough, 
in the war of the Spanish Succession, the object of which was to 
prevent either France or Austria from gaining so much power 
as to threaten other countries of Europe. 

355, CCLXI. 

Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori. Horace, Odes, II, 2. 

Sweet and fitting it is, to die for one's country. 

356, ccLXii. After the capture of Madrid l:»y Napoleon, Sir 
J. Moore retreated before Soult and Ney to Corunna, and was 
killed whilst covering the embarkation of his troops. [P.l 

371, ccLXXii. The Mermaid was the clubhouse of Shake- 
speare, Ben Jonson, and other choice spirits of that age. [P.] 



NOTES 621 

372, ccLXXiii. Maisie. Mary, — Scott has given us nothing 
more complete and lovely than this little song, which unites 
simplicity and dramatic power to a wildwood music of the 
rarest quality. No moral is drawn, far less any conscious anal- 
ysis of feeling attempted : — the pathetic meaning is left to be 
suggested by the mere presentment of the situation. A narrow 
criticism has often named this, which may be called the Homeric 
manner, superficial, from its apparent simple facility; but first- 
rate excellence in it is in truth one of the least common triumphs 
of poetry. This style should be compared with what is not 
less perfect in its way, the searching out of inner feeling, the 
expression of hidden meanings, the revelation of the heart of 
nature and of the soul within the soul, — the analytical method, 
in short, — most completely represented by Wordsworth and 
by Shelley. [P.] 

379, ccLXXvii. Wolfe resembled Keats, not only in his early 
death by consumption, and the fluent freshness of his poetical 
style, but in beauty of character: — brave, tender, energetic, 
unselfish, modest. Is it fanciful to find some reflex of these 
qualities in the " Burial " and " Mary "? Out of the abundance 
of the heart . . . [P.] 

380, ccLXXViii. From The Lady of the Lake. 

381, Corrie. Covert on a hillside. — Cumber. Trouble. [P.l 

382, ccLXXx. This book has not a few poems of greater 
power and more perfect execution than " Agnes," and the extract 
which we have ventured to make from the deep-hearted author's 
" Sad Thoughts " (ccxxiv). But none are more emphatically 
marked by the note of exquisiteness. [P.] 

383, ccLXXxi. From The Lay of the Last Minstrel, V. Roslin, 
with its chapel and castle, lie about seven miles south of Edin- 
burgh. The curiously ornate chapel, built in 1446, by William 
St. Clair, Lord of Roslin, contains the family vault of the Roslin 
family, where the barons were formerly buried in full armor, 
without coffins. According to the old tradition, the chapel 
appeared on fire before the death of any St. Clair. — Firth. An 
arm of the sea. 

Inch. Island. [P.] 

386, ccLxxxii, 1. 14. Promethean fire. A reminiscence of 
Shakespeare's 

I know not where is that Promethean heat 
That can thy light relume. Othello, V, ii, 12. 

where the reference is to a divine spark that could bring life 
back to Desdemona. The whole poem is full of Elizabethan 
turns of phrase. 

387, 1. 1. Clerks. Scholars. 

388, ccLXXXiii. From Poetry for Children (1809), by Charleg 



522 NOTES 

and Mary Lamb. This tender and original little piece seems 
clearly to reveal the work of that noble-minded and afflicted 
sister, who was at once the happiness, the misery, and the life- 
long blessing of her equally noble-minded brother. [P.l 

394, ccLXXxvii, 1. 16. Narrows. The waning moon appears 
in the sky at sunrise as a crescent, narrower each day. 

399, ccLXXXix. This poem has an exultation and a glory, 
joined with an exquisiteness of expression, which place it in 
the highest rank among the many masterpieces of its illustrious 
author. |P.l 

The cuckoo is not the bird known by that name in America, 
to which this description would hardly apply. 

401, ccxc, 1. 4. Lethe-wards. Towards Lethe, the river of 
oblivion. 

402, 1. 6. Pards. Leopards, which draw the chariot of Bac- 
chus. — 1. 7. Viewless. Invisible. 

403, 1. 13. Ruth. See the Bible, the book of Ruth, IL 

404, ccxci. Westminster Bridge. Over the Thames, in the 
heart of London, connecting the city proper with Westminster, 
where the Houses of Parliament and the Abbey are situated. 

406, ccxciv. Taxes. Accuses. 

412, ccxcix. Wood Street, Lothbury, Cheapside. In the 
busiest part of London. 

413, ccc. Ariel. The sprite in Shakespeare's The Tempest; 
compare the poems on pages 34 and 83, and notes. — Miranda. 
Daughter of Prospero, whom Ariel served. 

414, 1. 15. Interlunar swoon. Interval of the moon's invis- 
ibility. [P.l 

415, 1. 3. This idol. The guitar. 

418, cccii, 1. 15. Crown of rubies. The petals of the English 
daisy are tipped with pink. 

421, ccciv, 1. 9. Calpe. Gibraltar. — 1. 19. Lofoden. The 
Maelstrom whirlpool off the N.W. coast of Norway. [P.] 

422, 1. 22. Tented shores. It was the year of the Austrian 
attempt to drive the French from Germany; Hohenlinden was 
fought this same month. 

423, cccv. This lovely poem refers here and there to a ballad 
by Hamilton on the subject better treated in clxiii and clxiv. 
[P.l 

For an account of Wordsworth's walking trip with his sister 
Dorothy and Coleridge, see J. C. Shairp's Aspects of Poetry, 
the chapter entitled " The Three Yarrows." Note Words- 
worth's playful imitations of the Scotch dialect of the earlier 
Yarrow poems. 

435» cccxi. Datur Hora Quieti. An hour of quiet is given. 
Virgil, ^neid, V, 844. 



NOTES 523 

439, cccxv, 1. 8. Arcturi. Seemingly used for northern stars. 
— 1. 18. And wild roses, etc. Our language has perhaps no 
line modulated with more subtle sweetness. [P.] 

440, cccxvi. Coleridge describes this poem as the fragment 
of a dream-vision, — perhaps, an opium dream? — which com- 
posed itself in his mind when fallen asleep alter reading a few 
lines about " the Khan Kubla " in Purchas' Pilgrimage. [P.] 

443, cccxviii, 1. 16. Ingle. Hearth-fire. 

445, 1. 23. Ceres' daughter. Proserpine. — 1. 24. God of 
Torment. Pluto. [P.] 

1. 27. Hebe. The cupbearer to the gods. 

457, cccxxi. The leading idea of this beautiful description 
of a day's landscape in Italy appears to be: — on the voyage 
of life are many moments of pleasure, given by the sight of 
nature, who has power to heal even the worldliness and the 
uncharity of man. [P.l 

459, 1. 2. Amphitrite. Daughter to Ocean. [P.] 

464, cccxxii, 1. 11. Maenad. A frenzied nymph, attendant 
on Dionysos in the Greek mythology. May we not call this 
the most vivid, sustained, and impassioned amongst all Shel- 
ley's magical personifications of nature? [P.l 

465, 1. 1. Plants under water sympathize with the seasons 
of the land, and hence with the winds which affect them. [P.] 

466, cccxxiii. Written soon after the death, by shipwreck, 
of Wordsworth's brother John. This poem may be profitably 
compared with Shelley's following it. Each is the most com- 
plete expression of the innermost spirit of his art given by these 
great poets: — of that idea which, as in the case of the true 
painter (to quote the words of Reynolds), " subsists only in the 
mind: the sight never beheld it, nor has the hand expressed it: 
it is an idea residing in the breast of the artist, which he is always 
laboring to impart, and which he dies at last without impart- 
ing." [P.] 

468, 1. 12. The Kind. The human race. [P.] 

469, cccxxv. Ossian. Supposed to be an ancient Celtic 
bard; poems purporting to be by him were greatly admired in 
the early nineteenth century. 

471, cccxxvii. The royal Saint. Henry VI. [P.] 

The chapel is one of the most splendid examples of the highly 
ornate cone-vaulted style that succeeded pure Gothic archi- 
tecture in England. 

473, cccxxviii, 1. 11. This folk. Its has been here plausibly, 
but perhaps unnecessarily, conjectured. [P.l 

Every one knows the general story of the Italian Renaissance, 
of the Revival of Letters. — From Petrarch's day to our own, 
that ancient world has renewed its youth: poets and artists, 



524 NOTES 

students and thinkers, have yielded themselves wholly to its 
fascination, and deeply penetrated its spirit. Yet perhaps no 
one more truly has vivified, whilst idealizing, the picture of 
Greek country life in the fancied Golden Age, than Keats in 
these lovely (if somewhat unequally executed) stanzas : — his 
quick imagination, by a kind of " natural magic," more than 
supplying the scholarship which his youth had no opportunity 
of gaining. [P.] 

483, cccxxxv. Threnos. A lament or dirge. 

484, cccxxxvi. The Trosachs. A rocky, steep pass in the 
lake region of Scotland. 

486, cccxxxviii, 1. 1. Tabor. A small drum, used as accom- 
paniment to the pipe or trumpet. 



TOPICS FOR STUDY 



1. Turn over the pages of the book and pick out poems you 
already know and like. Be prepared to read one (of not over 
twenty hues) to the class well enough to win their interest. 

2. The Subject Matter of Poetry. (Assignment to individuals 
or groups.) Find out the attitude of three different poets 
toward the following subjects, each group of pupils taking one 
subject: The sea, flowers, death, friends estranged, love, music, 
war, books and scholarship, religion, children, animals, the past, 
the supernatural, other poets. 

3. Be prepared to read to the class two short poems, or parts 
of a longer poem, in which you can bring out strong contrasts 
of feehng. For instance, contrasting stanzas of "Alexander's 
Feast" (p. 199), or " The Passions" (p. 242); or two poems on 
the sea, like "The World is too much with us" (p. 470) and "A 
wet sheet and a flowing sea" (p. 340); or on love, as "One word 
is too often profaned" (p. 338) and "Why so pale and wan, 
fond lover" (p. 162). Make the class feel the difference. 

4. Memorize a poem of about fifteen lines to recite effectively. 
From now on, always learn at least four lines, in addition to the 
regular lesson. 

5. Composition. Comparing pages 5-7 of the Introduction 
with your own reading of the poems, discuss why certain sub- 
jects are more appropriate than others for poetry. 

6. Study the Introduction, pages 7-8. Pick out from poems 
anywhere in the book examples of simile, metaphor, and per- 
sonification that seem vivid and picturesque to you, and explain 
how they strengthen the thought of the poem. (The study of 
the Introduction, here and in following lessons, should be done 
with the teacher, when the work is assigned.) 

7. Read the Introduction, page 10 (beginning on page 9). Find 
the tunes of some of the songs in this book, and learn to sing 
them, singly or as a class. The songs of Shakespeare, Burns, 
Moore, and others are simple, and easily within the range of 
high-school voices. Or, find in the school song-book verses that 
you think worthy of notice as poetry set to appropriate tunes. 

8. Study the Introduction, pages 11-16 (in three lessons or 
more, depending on the previous training of the class). Look 
up the poems from which illustrative lines are quoted, and see if 

525 



526 TOPICS FOR STUDY 

the same measure holds throughout the poem. See if you can 
find it in other poems. 

9. Select a poem the meter of which is simple and regular; 
read or recite it in well-marked rhythm, yet without singsong. 

10. Select a poem in which the meter is compHcated by extra 
or missing syllables, by reversed accents, by hovering accents, 
or by irregular stanza form. Read or recite the poem in such 
a way as to bring out the interesting variations, without losing 
sight of the regular metrical swing. 

11. Study the sonnet (p. 16). Find two sonnets of the 
Shakespearian and two of the Italian form; be prepared to 
explain their rime-scheme, and to discuss whether the subject 
chosen fits into the natural divisions of this verse form. Or 
try to compose a sonnet of your own (optional). 

12. Study the ode (p. 17). Find all the odes in the book, and 
determine which, if any, follow the strict Pindaric form. One 
of them may well be chosen in class for reading or memorizing, 
each member of the class taking a strophe. 

13. Library Reference Work. (To be assigned to each pupil 
at the beginning of the study, and reported on at the end.) 
Select some one poet, represented in this book, and study his 
life and works, reporting to the class, in writing, on the following 
points : 

Bibliography : A list of all books about that poet, and of all 
important passages dealing with him, in the reference books 
and literary histories in your school or town library. 

A description (title, editor, publisher, date, number of pages) 
of the best edition of his works you find. 

Biography: A summary of the facts of his life, especially 
those that influenced his writing. 

Criticism : A short list of the poems for which this writer is 
most famous; and a discussion of his favorite subjects, his 
attitude toward them, his choice of poetic forms, and your 
impressions of his style. 

Quotation: A brief passage which you have memorized, as 
being worth knowing both for its own sake and because 
it is specially characteristic of this poet. 

14. Supplementary Work. (Voluntary; to be credited for 
honor standing.) Start a scrapbook or notebook of newspaper 
and magazine verse, or poems from other books than The Golden 
Treasury. Write opposite each poem the particular thing for 
which you chose it, — sentiment, observation, imagination, 
music, cleverness, or what. When the class has finished The 
Golden Treasury, you may hand this notebook in, to be passed 
axound the class, or may read your best selection. 



INDEX OF WRITERS 



WITH DATES OF BIRTH AND DEATH 

Alexander, William (1580-1640). page 

To Aurora 56 

Barbauld, Anna Lsetitia (1743-1825). 

' To Life 290 

Barnefield, Richard (16th century). 

The Nightingale 66 

Beaumont, Francis (1586-1616). 

On the Tombs in Westminster Abbey 127 

Blake, William (1757-1827). 

Love's Secret 236 

Infant Joy * 248 

A Cradle Song 248 

To the Muses 291 

Burns, Robert (1759-1796). 

Lament for Culloden 220 

A Farewell 231 

Ye banks and braes o' bonnie doon 237 

To a Mouse 252 

Mary Morison 262 

Bonnie Lesley 263 

O my Luve's like a red, red rose 264 

Highland Mary 265 

Duncan Gray 268 

Jean 272 

John Anderson 273 

Byron, George Gordon Noel (1788-1824). 

All for Love 298 

There be none of Beauty's daughters 301 

She walks in beauty, like the night 303 

When we two parted 322 

Elegy on Thyrza 335 

On the Castle of Chillon 347 

Youth and Age 364 

Elegy 377 

527 , 



528 INDEX OF WRITERS 

Campbell, Thomas (1777-1844). page 

Lord UUin's Daughter 310 

To the Evening Star 318 

Earl March look'd on his dying child 331 

Ye Mariners of England 341 

Battle of the Baltic . 342 

Hohenlinden 351 

The Beech Tree's Petition 406 

Ode to Winter 420 

Song to the Evening Star 434 

The Soldier's Dream 437 

The River of Life 481 

Campion, Thomas (c. 1567-1620). 

Basia 52 

Advice to a Girl 63 

In Imagine Pertransit Homo 70 

Sleep, angry beauty, sleep 72 

A Renunciation 75 

O Crudelis Amor 79 

Sic Transit 97 

The man of life upright 98 

A Hymn in Praise of Neptune 136 

Fortunati Nimium 181 

Carew, Thomas (1589-1639). 

The True Beauty 148 

Carey, Henry ( 1743). 

Sally in our Alley 229 

CiBBER, Colley (1671-1757). 

The Blind Boy 210 

Coleridge, Hartley (1796-1849). 

She is not fair to outward view 305 

Coleridge, Samuel Taylor (1772^1834). 

Love (Genevieve) 294 

Kubla Khan 440 

Youth and Age 474 

Collins, John (18th century). 

Tomorrow 288 

Collins, William (1720-1756). 

Ode to Simplicity 207 

Ode written in 1746 220 

The Passions 242 

Ode to Evening 255 

Cowley, Abraham (1618-1667). 

A Supplication 163 

On the Death of Mr. William Hervey 171 



INDEX OF WRITERS 529 

CowPER, William (1731-1800). page 

Loss of the Roval George 226 

To a Young Lady 233 

The Poplar Field 251 

The Shrubbery 278 

The Solitude of Alexander Selkirk 281 

To Mary Unwin 283 

To the Same 284 

The Castaway 286 

Crashaw, Richard (1615?-1652). 

Wishes for the Supposed Mistress 137 

Cunningham, Allen (1784-1842). 

V A wet sheet and a flowing sea 340 

Daniel, Samuel (1562-1619). 

Care-charmer Sleep 67 

Dekker, Thomas ( 1638?). 

The Happy Heart 96 

Devereux, Robert (Earl of Essex) (1567-1601). 

A Wish 101 

Donne, John (1573-1631). 

Present in Absence 42 

Drayton, Michael (1563-1631). 

Love's Farewell 70 

Drummond, William (1585-1649). 

Summons to Love 35 

A Lament 81 

To his Lute 82 

This Life, which seems so fair 97 

The Lessons of Nature 99 

Doth then the world go thus? . 100 

Saint John Baptist 102 

Dryden, John (1031-1700). 

Song for St. Cecilia's Day, 1687 112 

Alexander's Feast 199 

Elliott, Jane (18th century). 

The Flowers of the Forest (Flodden) 221 

Fletcher, John (1576-1625). 

Melancholy 165 

Gay, John (1685-1732). 

Black-eyed Susan 227 

Goldsmith, Oliver (1728-1774). 

When lovely woman stoops to folly ". . 237 



530 INDEX OF WRITERS 

Graham, Robert (1735-1797). page 

If doughty deeds my lady please 232 

Gray, Thomas (1716-1771). 

Ode on the Pleasure arising from Vicissitude .... 205 

On a Favourite Cat 211 

The Bard 215 

The Progress of Poesy 238 

Ode on the Spring 249 

Elegy written in a Country Churchyard 257 

Ode on a Distant Prospect of Eton College 275 

Hymn to Adversity 279 

Greene, Robert (1561?-1592). 

Sephestia's Song to her Child 79 

Habington, William (1605-1645). 

Nox Nocti Indicat Scientiam 195 

Herbert, George (1593-1632). 

The Gifts of God 132 

Herrick, Robert (1591-1674?). 

Counsel to Girls 145 

To Dianeme 149 

Corinna's Maying 152 

The Poetry of Dress, I 155 

The Poetry of Dress, II 155 

To Anthea 157 

To Blossoms 175 

To Daffodils 176 

Heywood, Thomas ( 1649?). 

Give my Love good-morrow 89 

Hood, Thomas (1798-1845). 

Past and Present 366 

The Bridge of Sighs 373 

The Death Bed 381 

JoNSON, Ben (1574-1637). 

The Noble Nature 132 

Hymn to Diana 137 

To Celia 150 

Keats, John (1795-1821). 

Ode on the Poets 292 

On first looking into Chapman's Homer 293 

Happy Insensibility 324 

La Belle Dame sans Merci 326 

Bright Star! 332 

The Terror of Death .... 333 



INDEX OF WRITERS 531 

Keats, John (continued). page 

The Mermaid Tavern 371 

Ode to a Nightingale 401 

To one who has been long in city pent 404 

Ode to Autumn 419 

The Realm of Fancy 443 

Ode on a Grecian Urn 472 

The Human Seasons 482 

Lamb, Mary (1764-1847). 

In Memoriam 388 

Lamb, Charles (1775-1835). 

The Old Familiar Faces 361 

Hester 378 

On an Infant dying as soon as born 385 

Lindsay, Anne (1750-1825). 

Auld Robin Gray 266 

Lodge, Thomas (1556-1625). 

Rosaline 47 

Rosalynd's Madrigal 87 

Logan, John (1748-1788). 

The Braes of Yarrow 222 

Lovelace, Richard (1618-1658). 

To Lucasta, on going to the Wars 146 

To Althea from Prison 160 

To Lucasta, going beyond the Seas 161 

Lylye, John (1554-1600). 

Cupid and Campaspe 88 

Lyte, Henry Francis (1793-1847). 

A Lost Love 309 

Agnes 382 

Marlowe, Christopher (1562-1593). 

The Passionate Shepherd to his Love 38 

Marvell, Andrew (1620-1678). 

Horatian Ode, upon Cromwell's return from Ireland . . 115 

The Picture of Little T.C 142 

The Girl describes her Fawn 176 

Thoughts in a Garden 178 

Song of the Emigrants in Bermuda 193 

MiCKLE, William Julius (1734-1788). 

The Sailor's Wife 269 

Milton, John (1608-1674). 

Ode on the Morning of Christ's Nativity 103 

On the late Massacre in Piedmont 115 

Lycidas 120 



532 INDEX OF WRITERS 

Milton, John (continued). page 

When the Assault was intended to the City 129 

On his Blindness 130 

To Mr. Lawrence 134 

To Cyriack Skinner 135 

To the Lady Margaret Ley 147 

L'AUegro 182 

II Penseroso . . . . ' 187 

At a Solemn Music 194 

Moore, Thomas (1780-1852). 

Echoes 317 

At the mid hour of night 334 

Pro Patria Mori 355 

The Journey Onwards 362 

The Light of other Days 367 

Nairn, Carolina (1766-1845). 

The Land o' the Leal 274 

Nash, Thomas (1567-1601?). 

Spring 33 

NoRRis, John (1657-1711). 

Hymn to Darkness 197 

Philips, Ambrose (1671-1749). 

To Charlotte Pulteney 212 

Pope, Alexander (1688-1744). 

Solitude 209 

Prior, Matthew (1662-1721). 

The merchant, to secure his treasure 235 

QuARLES, Francis (1592-1644). 

A Mystical Ecstasy 167 

Rogers, Samuel (1762-1855). 

The Sleeping Beauty 234 

A Wish 254 

Scott, Walter (1771-1832). 

The Outlaw 299 

Jock o' Hazeldean 315 

A Serenade 318 

Where shall the lover rest 325 

The Rover 328 

The Maid of Neidpath 330 

Gathering Song of Donald the Black 338 

The Pride of Youth 372 



INDEX OF WRITERS 533 

Scott, Walter (continued). page 

Coronach 3S() 

Rosabelle 383 

Hunting Song 391 

Datur Hora Quieti 435 

Sedley, Charles (1639-1701). 

Child and Maiden 143 

Not, Celia, that I juster am 159 

Shakespeare, William (1564-1616). 

The Fairy Life, I. . . 34 

The Fairy Life, II 34 

Sonnet-Time and Love, I. 36 

Sonnet-Time and Love, II 37 

A Madrigal 40 

Under the greenwood tree 41 

It was a lover and his lass 41 

Sonnet — Absence 43 

" Absence 44 

" A Consolation . 45 

" The Unchangeable 45 

Sonnet 46 

To his Love 51 

" To his Love 51 

Love's Perjuries 54 

Sonnet — True Love 57 

Carpe Diem 59 

Winter 61 

Sonnet — That time of year 61 

" Memory 62 

" Revolutions 63 

Farewell! 64 

" The Life without Passion 65 

Frustra — Take, O take those lips away 69 

Sonnet — Blind Love 71 

Blow, blow, thou winter wind 75 

Dirge of Love 81 

Fidele — Fear no more the heat 83 

A Sea Dirge 83 

Sonnet — Post Mortem 84 

The Triumph of Death 85 

Young Love 86 

Sonnet — Soul and Body 98 

The World's Way 101 

Shelley, Percy Bysshe (1792-1822). 

The Indian Serenade 302 

I fear thy kisses, gentle maiden ' . 305 



534 INDEX OF WRITERS 

Shelley, Percy Bysshe (continued) . page 

Love's Philosophy 316 

To the Night 320 

The Flight of Love 329 

One word is too often profaned 338 

Stanzas written in Dejection near Naples 369 

To a Skylark 393 

Ozymandias of Egypt 405 

To a Lady, with a Guitar 413 

The Invitation 429 

The Recollection 431 

To the Moon 436 

A Dream of the Unknown 438 

Written among the Euganean Hills 457 

Ode to the West Wind 463 

The Poet's Dream 468 

A Dirge 483 

Threnos 483 

Music, when soft voices die 492 

Shirley, James (1596-1666). 

The Last Conqueror 128 

Death the Leveller 128 

Sidney, Philip (1554-1586). 

Via Amoris 43 

A Ditty 58 

Sleep 63 

The Nightingale 68 

The Moon 78 

Smart, Christopher (1722-1770). 

The Song of David 247 

SouTHEY, Robert (1774-1843). 

After Blenheim 353 

The Scholar 370 

Spenser, Edmund (1553-1598-9). 

Prothalamion 89 

Suckling, John (1608-9-1641). 

Encouragements to a Lover 162 

Sylvester, Joshua (1563-1618). 

Love's Omnipresence 69 

Thomson, James (1700-1748). 

Rule Britannia 213 

For ever. Fortune, wilt thou prove 235 

Vaughan, Henry (1621-1695). 

The Retreat 133 

Friends in Paradise 174 



INDEX OF WRITERS 535 

Vaughan, Henry (continued). page 

A Vision 198 

Verstegan, Richard (c. 1635). 

Upon my lap my sovereign sits 168 

Waller, Edmund (1605-1687). 

Go, lovely Rose 150 

On a Girdle 156 

Webster, John ( 1638?). 

A Land Dirge 84 

WiLMOT, John (1647-1680). 

Constancy 144 

Wither, George (1588-1667). 

The Manly Heart 164 

Wolfe, Charles (1791-1823). 

The Burial of Sir John Moore 356 

To Mary 379 

Wordsworth, William (1770-1850). 

She was a phantom of delight 303 

She dwelt among the untrodden ways 306 

I travell'd among unknown men 306 

The Education of Nature 307 

A slumber did my spirit seal 309 

Lucy Gray 312 

To a distant Friend 322 

Desideria 334 

Ode to Duty 345 

England and Switzerland, 1802 348 

On the extinction of the Venetian Republic .... 349 

London, 1802 349 

350 

When I have borne in memory 351 

Simon Lee 358 

A Lesson 365 

The Affliction of Margaret 388 

To the Skylark 392 

The Green Linnet 398 

To the Cuckoo 399 

Upon Westminster Bridge 404 

Composed at Neidpath Castle 406 

Admonition to a Traveller 408 

To the Highland Girl of Inversneyde 408 

The Reaper 411 

The Reverie of poor Susan 412 

The Daffodils 416 

To the Daisy 417 



536 INDEX OF WRITERS 

Wordsworth, William (continued). page 

Yarrow Un visited, 1803 423 

Yarrow Visited, 1814 425 

By the Sea 434 

To Sleep 437 

The Inner Vision 442 

Written in Early Spring 446 

Ruth, or. the Influences of Nature 447 

Nature and the Poet 466 

Glen-Almain, the Narrow Glcu 469 

The World is too much with us 470 

Within King's College Chapel, Cambridge 471 

The Two April Mornings 475 

The Fountain 478 

The Trossachs 484 

My heart leaps up 484 

Ode on Intimations of Immortality 485 

WooTTON, Henry (1568-1639). 

Character of a Happy Life 131 

EHzabeth of Bohemia .146 

Wyat, Thomas (1503-1542). 

A Supplication 55 

The Lover's Appeal 65 

Anonymous. 

Omnia Vincit 39 

Colin 49 

A Picture 49 

A Song for Music 50 

In Lacrimas 56 

Love's Insight 58 

An honest Autolycus 60 

The Unfaithful Shepherdess 73 

Advice to a Lover • 74 

A sweet Lullaby 76 

A Dilemma 86 

The Great Adventurer 140 

Love in thy youth, fair Maid • 149 

Cherry Ripe • 151 

My Love in her attire 156 

Love not me for comely grace 159 

Forsaken 166 

Fair Helen 169 

The Twa Corbies 170 

Willie Drowned in Yarrow 224 

Absence 271 



INDEX OF FIRST LINES 



PAGE 

A Chieftain to the Highlands bound 310 

A child's a plaything for an hour 388 

A flock of sheep that leisurely pass by 437 

A slumber did my spirit seal 309 

A «weet disorder in the dress 155 

A weary lot is thine, fair maid 328 

A wet sheet and a flowing sea 340 

Absence, hear thou this protestation 42 

Ah, Chloris! could I now but sit 143 

Ah, County Guy, the hour is nigh 318 

All in the Downs the fleet was moor'd 227 

All thoughts, all passions, all delights 294 

And are ye sure the news is true 269 

And is this — Yarrow? — This the Stream 425 

And thou art dead, as young and fair 335 

And wilt thou leave me thus 65 

Ariel to Miranda: — Take 413 

Art thou pale for weariness 436 

Art thou poor, yet hast thou golden slumbers 96 

As it fell upon a day 66 

As I was walking all alane 170 

As slow our ship her foamy track 362 

At the corner of Wood Street, when daylight appears . . . 412 

At the mid hour of night, when stars are weeping, I fly 334 

Avenge, O Lord! Thy slaughter'd saints, whose bones . . . 115 

Awake, Aeolian lyre, awake 238 

Awake, awake, my Lyre 163 

Bards of Passion and of Mirth 292 

Beauty sat bathing by a spring 49 

Behold her, single in the field 411 

Being your slave, what should I do but tend 43 

Beneath these fruit-tree boughs that shed 398 

Best and brightest, come away 429 

Bid me to live, and I will live 157 

Blest pair of Sirens, pledges of Heaven's joy 194 

537 



538 INDEX OF FIRST LINES 

PAGE 

Blow, blow, thou winter wind 75 

Bright Star! would I were steadfast as thou art 332 

Call for the robin-redbreast and the wren 84 

Calm was the day, and through the trembling air ... . 89 

Captain, or Colonel, or Knight in Arms 129 

Care-charmer Sleep, son of the sable Night 67 

Come away, come away. Death 81 

Come, cheerful day, part of my life to me 97 

Come little babe, come silly soul 76 

Come live with me and be my Love 38 

Come, Sleep: O Sleep! the certain knot of peace .... 63 

Come unto these yellow sands 34 

Crabbed Age and Youth 40 

Cupid and my Campasp6 play'd 88 

Cyriack, whose grandsire, on the royal bench 135 

Daughter of Jove, relentless power 279 

Daughter to that good Earl, once President 147 

Degenerate Douglas! oh, the unworthy lord 406 

Doth then the world go thus, doth all thus move .... 100 

Down in yon garden sweet and gay 224 

Drink to me only with thine eyes 150 

Duncan Gray cam here to woo 268 

Earl March look'd on his dying child 331 

Earth has not anything to show more fair 404 

E'en like two little bank-dividing brooks 157 

Eternal Spirit of the chainless Mind 347 

Ethereal minstrel ! pilgrim of the sky 392 

Ever let the Fancy roam 443 

Fain would I change that note 139 

Fair Daffodils, we weep to see 176 

Fair pledges of a fruitful tree 175 

Farewell! thou art too dear for my possessing 64 

Fear no more the heat o' the sun 83 

Fine knacks for ladies, cheap, choice, brave and new ... 60 

Follow thy fair sun, unhappy shadow 70 

For ever. Fortune, wilt thou prove 235 

Forget not yet the tried intent 55 

Four Seasons fill the measure of the year 482 

From Harmony, from heavenly Harmony 112 

From Stirling Castle we had seen 423 

Full fathom five thy father lies 83 



INDEX OF FIRST LINES 539 

PAGE 

Gather ye rose-buds while ye may 145 

Gem of the crimson-colour'd Even 318 

Get up, get up, for shame! The blooming morn .... 152 

Go fetch to me a pint o' wine 231 

Go, lovely Rose 150 

Hail thou most sacred venerable thing 197 

Hail to thee, blithe Spirit 393 

Happy the man, whose wish and care 209 

Happy those early days, when I 133 

Happy were he could finish forth his fate 101 

He is gone on the mountain 380 

Hence, all you vain delights . 165 

Hence, loathed Melancholy 182 

Hence, vain deluding Joys 187 

He sang of God, the mighty source 247 

He that loves a rosy cheek 148 

High-way, since you my chief Parnassus be 43 

How happy is he born and taught 131 

How like a winter hath my absence been 44 

How sleep the brave who sink to rest 220 

How sweet the answer Echo makes 317 

How vainly men themselves amaze 178 

I am monarch of all I survey 281 

I arise from dreams of Thee 302 

I cannot change, as others do 144 

I dream'd that as I wander'd by the way 438 

I fear thy kisses, gentle maiden 305 

I have had playmates, I have had companions 361 

I have no name 248 

I heard a thousand blended notes 446 

I meet thy pensive, moonlight face 309 

I met a traveller from an antique land 405 

I remember, I remember 366 

I saw Eternity the other night 198 

I saw her in childhood 382 

I saw my Lady weep 56 

I saw where in the shroud did lurk 385 

I travell'd among unknown men 306 

I wander'd lonely as a cloud 416 

I was thy neighbour once, thou rugged Pile 466 

I wish I were where Helen lies 169 

If aught of oaten stop or pastoral song 255 

If doughty deeds my lady please 232 



540 INDEX OF FIRST LINES 

PAGE 

If I had thought thou couldst have died 379 

If Thou survive my well-contented day 84 

If to be absent were to be 161 

I'm wearing awa', Jean 274 

In a drear-nighted December 324 

In the downhill of life, when I find I'm declining .... 288 

In the sweet shire of Cardigan 358 

In this still \Aiico, remote from men 469 

In Xanadu did Kubla Khan 440 

It is a beauteous evening, calm and free 434 

It is not growing like a tree 132 

It was a dismal and a fearful night 171 

It was a lover and his lass 41 

It was a summer evening 353 

I've heard them lilting at our ewe-milking 221 

Jack and Joan, they think no ill 181 

John Anderson my jo, John 273 

Lady, when I behold the roses sprouting 86 

Lawrence, of virtuous father virtuous son 134 

Let me not to the marriage of true minds 57 

Life! I know not what thou art 290 

Like as the waves make towards the pebbled shore .... 63 

Like to the clear in highest sphere 47 

Love in my bosom, like a bee . 87 

Love in thy youth, fair Maid, be wise 149 

Love not me for comely grace 159 

Lo! where the rosy-bosom 'd Hours 249 

Many a green isle needs must be 457 

Mary! I want a lyre with other strings 283 

Milton ! thou shouldst be living at this hour 350 

Mine be a cot beside the hill 254 

Mortality, behold and fear 127 

Most sweet it is with unuplifted eyes 442 

Much have I travell'd in the realms of gold 293 

Music, when soft voices die 492 

My days among the Dead are past 370 

My heart aches, and a drowsy numbness pains 401 

My heart leaps up when I behold 484 

My Love in her attire doth shew her wit 156 

My lute, be as thou wert when thou didst grow .... 82 

My thoughts hold mortal strife 81 

My true-love hath my heart, and I have his 58 



INDEX OF FIRST LINES 541 

PAGE 

Never love unless you can 53 

Never seek to tell thy love 236 

No longer mourn for me when I am dead 85 

Not a drum was heard, not a funeral note 356 

Not, Celia, that I juster am 159 

Now the golden Morn aloft 205 

Now the last day of many days 431 

O blithe new-comer! I have heard ^^ 399 

O Brignall banks are wild and fair ^F- 299 

O Friend! I know not which way I must look 349 

O happy shades! to me unblest 278 

O'if thou knew'st how thou thyself dost harm 56 

O leave this barren spot to me 406 

O listen, listen, ladies gay 383 

O lovers' eyes are sharp to see 330 

O Mary, at thy window be 262 

O me! what eyes hath Love put in my head 71 

O Mistress mine, where are you roaming 59 

O my Luve's like a red, red rose 264 

O never say that I was false of heart 45 

O saw ye bonnie Lesley 263 

O say what is that thing call'd Light 210 

O talk not to me of a name great in story 298 

O Thou, by Nature taught 207 

O waly waly up the bank 165 

O what can ail thee, knight-at-arms 326 

O wild West Wind, thou breath of Autumn's being .... 463 

O World! O Life! O Time 483 

Obscurest night involved the sky 286 

Of all the girls that are so smart 229 

Of a' the airts the wind can blaw 272 

Of Nelson and the North 342 

Of Neptune's empire let us sing 136 

Of this fair volume which we World do name 99 

Oft I had heard of Lucy Gray 312 

Oft in the stilly night 367 

Oh snatch'd away in beauty's bloom 377 

On a daJ^ alack the day 54 

On a Poet's lips I slept 468 

Once did She hold the gorgeous East in fee 349 

One more Unfortunate 373 

One word is too often profaned 338 

On Linden, when the sun was low 351 

Our bugles sang truce, for the night-cloud had lower'd . . . 437 



542 INDEX OF FIRST LINES 

PAGE 

Over the mountains 140 

Pack, clouds, away, and welcome day 89 

Phoebus, arise 35 

Pibroch of Donuil Dhu 338 

Poor Soul, the centre of my sinful earth 98 

Proud Maisie is in the wood 372 

Queen and Huntress, chaste and fair 137 

Rough wind, that moanest loud 483 

Ruin seize thee, ruthless King 215 

Season of mist and mellow fruitfulness 419 

See with what simplicity 142 

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day 51 

Shall I, wasting in despair 164 

She dwelt among the untrodden ways 306 

She is not fair to outward view 305 

She walks in beauty, like the night 303 

She was a Phantom of delight 303 

Since brass, nor stone, nor earth, nor boundless sea ... 37 

Since there's no help, come let us kiss and part 70 

Sleep, angry beauty, sleep and fear not me 72 

Sleep on, and dream of Heaven awhile 234 

Sleep, sleep, beauty bright 248 

Souls of Poets dead and gone 371 

Spring, the sweet Spring, is the year's pleasant king ... 33 

Star that bringest home the bee 434 

Stern Daughter of the Voice of God 345 

Surprized by joy — impatient as the wind 334 

Sweet, be not proud of those two eyes 149 

Sweet Highland Girl, a very shower 408 

Sweet Love, if thou wilt gain a monarch's glory .... 49 

Sweet stream, that winds through yonder glade 233 

Swiftly walk over the western wave 320 

Take, O take those lips away 69 

Tax not the royal Saint with vain expense 471 

Tell me not. Sweet, I am unkind 146 

Tell me where is Fancy bred 86 

That time of year thou may'st in me behold 61 

That which her slender waist confined 156 

The curfew tolls the knell of parting day 257 

The forward youth that would appear 115 



INDEX OF FIRST LINES 543 

PAGE 

The fountains mingle with the river 316 

The glories of our blood and state 128 

The last and greatest Herald of Heaven's King 102 

The lovely lass o' Inverness 220 

The man of life upright 98 

The merchant, to secure his treasure 235 

The more we live, more brief appear 481 

The nightingale, as soon as April bringeth 68 

The poplars are fell'd; farewell to the shade 251 

There be none of Beauty's daughters 301 

There is a Flower, the lesser Celandine 365 

There is a garden in her face 151 

There's not a joy the world can give like that it takes away 364 

There's not a nook within this solemn Pass 484 

There was a time when meadow, grove, and stream .... 485 

The sea hath many thousand sands 74 

The sun is warm, the sky is clear 369 

The sun upon the lake is low 435 

The twentieth year is well-nigh past 284 

The World is too much with us; late and soon 470 

They are all gone into the world of light 174 

They that have power to hurt, and will do none 65 

This is the month, and this the happy morn 103 

This Life, which seems so fair 97 

Though others may Her brow adore 58 

Thou art not fair, for all thy red and white 75 

Thou still unravish'd bride of quietness 472 

Three years she grew in sun and shower 307 

Thy braes were bonny, Yarrow stream 222 

Timely blossom. Infant fair 212 

Tired with all these, for restful death I cry 101 

Toll for the Brave 226 

To me, fair Friend, you never can be old 46 

To one who has been long in city pent 404 

Turn back, you wanton flyer 52 

'Twas at the royal feast for Persia won 199 

' T was on a lofty vase's side . 211 

Two voices are there; one is of the Sea 348 

Under the greenwood tree 41 

Upon my lap my sovereign sits 168 

Verse, a breeze 'mid blossoms straying 474 

Victorious men of earth, no more ...,,,.. 128 



544 INDEX TO FIRST LINES 

PAGE 

Waken, lords and ladies gay 391 

Wee, sleekit, cow'rin', tim'rous beastie 252 

Weep not, my wanton, smile upon my knee 79 

Weep you no more, sad fountains 50 

Were I as base as is the lowly plain 59 

We talk'd with open heart, and tongue 478 

We walk'd along, while bright and red 475 

We watch'd her breathing thro' the night 381 

Whenas in silks my Julia goes 155 

When Britain first at Heaven's command 213 

When first the fiery-mantled Sun 420 

When God at first made Man 132 

When he who adores thee has left but the name 355 

When icicles hang by the wall 61 

When I consider how my light is spent 130 

When I have borne in memory what has tamed . . . .351 

When I have fears that I may cease to be 333 

When I have seen by Time's fell hand defaced 36 

When I survey the bright 195 

When I think on the happy days 271 

When in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes 45 

When in the chronicle of wasted time 51 

When lovely woman stoops to folly 237 

When Love with unconfined wings 160 

When maidens such as Hester die 378 

When Music, heavenly maid, was young 242 

When Ruth was left half desolate 447 

When the lamp is shatter'd 329 

When the sheep are in the fauld, and the kye at hame . . . 266 

When thou must home to shades of underground .... 79 

When to the sessions of sweet silent thought 62 

When we two parted 322 

Where art thou, my beloved Son 388 

Where shall the lover rest 325 

Where the bee sucks, there suck I 34 

Where the remote Bermudas ride 193 

Whether on Ida's shady brow 291 

While that the sun with his beams hot 73 

Whoe'er she be 137 

Why art thou silent? Is thy love a plant 322 

Why so pale and wan, fond lover 162 

Why weep ye by the tide, ladie 315 

With how sad steps, O Moon, thou climb'st the skies ... 78 

With little here to do or see 417 

With sweetest milk and sugar first 176 



INDEX TO FIRST LINES 545 

PAGE 

Ye banks and braes and streams around 265 

Ye banks and braes o' bonnie Doon 237 

Ye distant spires, ye antique towers 275 

Ye Mariners of England 341 

Yes, there is holy pleasure in thine eye 408 

Yet once more, O ye laurels, and once more 120 

You meaner beauties of the night 146 



ABERNETHY'S 
AMERICAN LITERATURE 

By JULIAN W. ABERNETHY, Ph.D. 
PoRMBRLY Principal OF Berkeley Institute, Brooklyn, N. Y, 

514 pages, 12mo, cloth. Price $1. 10 

The author's long and conspicuously successful experience 
as a teacher and the time and thought he has devoted to the 
work encourage us to believe that this book will be particularly 
adapted to the varying needs of his fellow teachers. 

The plan of the book includes a brief account of the growth 
of our literature considered as part of our national history, with 
such biographical and critical material as will best make the 
first-hand study of American authors interesting and profitable. 

One of the most interesting features of the book is the supple- 
menting of the author's critical estimates of the value of the 
work of the more important American writers with opinions 
quoted from contemporary sources. Other strong points are 
the attention given to more recent contributions to American 
literature and the fact that Southern literature is accorded a 
consideration commensurate with its interest and value. 

The pedagogical merit of the book is indicated by the care 
which has been given to the production of a teaching apparatus 
which is at once simple and entirely adequate. At the end of 
each chapter, two lists of selections are provided for each im- 
portant author, one for critical study, the other for outside 
reading. Lists of reading material for the historical back- 
ground also are given. Study along the lines indicated will lead 
to a closer correlation of history and literature than is usually 
secured, and to a more just appreciation of the literature. 

The books included in the list at the end of the work con- 
stitute an ample and fairly complete library of biography and 
criticism for students of American literature. 

CHARLES W. KENT, M. A., Ph. D., Linden Kent 
Memorial School of English Literature, University of 
Virginia, writes: 

I am sufficiently pleased with Abemethy's American Litera- 
ture to adopt it for use in my class next session. This I have 
done after a careful examination of nearly all of the college 
text-books on American literature now on the market. 



MERRILLS ENGLISH TEXTS 

COMPLETE EDITIONS 

Addison, Steele, and Budgell — The Sir Roger 

de Coverley Papers in ' 'The Spectator' ' . . .30 

Browning — Poems 25 

Bunyan — Pilgrim's Progress, Part I 40 

Byron — Childe Harold, Canto IV, and The 

Prisoner of Chillon 25 

Carlyle — An Essay on Burns 25 

Coleridge — The Rime of the Ancient Mariner 

and other Poems 25 

Coleridge— The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, 

and Lowell — The Vision of Sir Launfal, 

Combined 40 

Defoe — Robinson Crusoe, Part I 50 

De Quincey — Joan of Arc, and The English 

Mail Coach 25 

Dickens— A Tale of Two Cities 50 

Eliot, George — Silas Marner . , 40 

Emerson — Essays (Selected) 40 

Goldsmith — The Deserted Village and other 

Poems 25 

Goldsmith— The Vicar of Wakefield 30 

Gray — An Elegy in a Country Churchyard, 

and Goldsmith — The Deserted Village, 

Combined 30 

Hale — The Man Without a Country, and My 

Double, and How He Undid Me 25 

Hawthorne — The House of the Seven Gables . 40 
Homer— The Odyssey, Books VI to XIV, 

XVIII to XXIV. (English translation) .40 



Irving— The Sketch Book 50 

Lamb — Essays of Elia 50 

Lincoln — Selections 25 

Lowell — The Vision of Sir Launfal 25 

Macaulay — Essays on Lord Clive andWarren 

Hastings 40 

Macaulay — Essay on Samuel Johnson ... .25 
Macaulay — Lays of Ancient Rome, and Ar- 
nold — Sohrab and Rustum, Combined . . .30 
Milton — Lycidas, Comus, L' Allegro, II Pen- 

seroso, and other Poems 25 

Palgrave — Golden Treasury (First Series) . .50 

Parkman — The Oregon Trail 50 

Poe — The Raven, Longfellow — The Court- 
ship of Miles Standish, and Whittier — 

Snow Bound, Combined 25 

Scott — Ivanhoe 50 

Shakespeare — A Midsummer Night's Dream .25 

Shakespeare — As You Like It 25 

Shakespeare — Julius Caesar 25 

Shakespeare — King Henry V 25 

Shakespeare — Macbeth 25 

Shakespeare — Merchant of Venice 25 

Shakespeare— Twelfth Night 25 

Stevenson — An Inland Voyage and Travels 

with a Donkey 40 

Stevenson — Treasure Island 40 

Tennyson — Idylls of the King 30 

Thoreau— V^aiden 50 

Washington — Farewell Address, and Web- 
ster— First Bunker Hill Oration :25 



GRADED POETRY 

Edited by KATHERINE D. BLAKE 

Principal Girls' Department, Public School No. 6 

New York City 

AND 

GEORGIA ALEXANDER 

Supervising Principal, Indianapolis, Indiana 

7 Books. 96 pages each, 12mo, cloth 
PRICE PER VOLUME, 20 CENTS 

Poetry is the chosen language of childhood and youth. 
The baby repeats words again and again for the mere joy 
of their sound; the melody of nursery rhymes gives a 
delight which is quite independent of the meaning of the 
words. Not until youth approaches maturity is there 
an equal pleasure in the rounded periods of elegant prose. 
It is in childhood, therefore, that the young mind should 
be stored with poems whose rhythm will be a present de- 
light and whose beautiful thoughts will not lose their 
charm in later years. 

The selections for the lowest grades are addressed pri- 
marily to the feeling for verbal beauty, the recognition of 
which in the mind of the child is fundamental to the plan 
of this work. The editors have felt that the inclusion of 
critical notes in these little books intended for elementary 
school children would be not only superfluous, but, in the 
degree in which critical comment drew the child's atten- 
tion from the text, subversive of the desired result. Nor 
are there any notes on methods. The best way to teach 
children to love a poem is to read it inspiringly to them. 

CHARLES E. MERRILL CO., Publishers 
44-60 East Twenty-third Street, New York 



I 



JAM S 1912 



One copy del. to Cat. Div. 



JAN 3 1012 



